The health insurance death spiral has officially begun its final phase!
this post was submitted on 22 Oct 2025
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politics
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Almost like a single payer system is the only sensible way it was ever possible to give healthcare to everyone.
Hopefully the collapse of the US as it is brings out something better from the ashes some day, cause this shit is unpalatable
We need single payer for base insurance of quality of life. The fact is we've reached the point that we can provide a basic quality of life for every American and don't. (and even globally with a United humanity.) name any major social, economic, political, and environmental crisis currently and the sad truth is the wealthy, bigots, powerful, and psychopaths want it that way.
Everything is set to be horrible for everyone this year
November is looking to be a wildly horrific month for everyone
Is the government staying shut down?
Magic 8 ball says: likely
No SNAP benefits as well.
(Meanwhile, everyone not in America): WTF is a health plan enrollment period?
It's the 2 weeks or so in which your insurance company allows you to adjust your coverage. To facilitate this, they give you brochures designed to be confusing to try and trick you into paying maximum premiums alwith minimal coverage.
I had an employer that bragged about bringing employee down costs with the new provider by 20% per payckeck as the reason for the drastic reduction in coverage and higher copays. They glossed over the fact that we were changing from bi-weekly to weekly paychecks, so the 20 percent reduction per paycheck was actually a 60 percent increase overall.
for ~~everyone~~ Americans
Gotta fund wars somehow, amirite?
That’s what my social security taxes are for!
Just give it a year and we will have our American made industries. Every person in the usa will have their own ai company. You just have to stay alive for the next 12 months, don't worry everything will be fine
This will work in the favor of the Confederate Party talking points - I just saw Leavitt talking about "Obamacare" being terrible, etc....this will get blamed on Obama instead.
Not that the pedo party has any plans at all to make anyone's lives in America any better, unless they are at least centimillionaires and friends with Donvict.
I'm a young healthy male without much need for health insurance. Do I opt myself out of it for the next year? The money I'd save on my employer sponsored premium would be fairly significant and help me get assets I actually need. And fuck the healthcare industry.
Consider a high deductible plan with an HSA, especially if your employer contributes to the HSA and you don't have any underlying conditions (or dependents with them) which make it more likely for you to hit the deductible.
You can use the HSA funds later when you or your dependents need health care even if you've switched to a low deductible plan.
Yes, I agree with that! HSAs are really good, especially if you're healthy and not using the insurance. You don't pay income tax on the money you put in it, and when you use it to pay for health expenses later, it's also not taxed, so you never paid income tax on it. That's like getting a 20 or 30% return on your money (or whatever tax bracket you were in and would have paid on it. So I suggest putting as much as you can into it and if your employer also puts some in that's even better.
I did that for the last few years. So now I have to get some dental work done soon that's going to cost over a thousand bucks and they'll want the money the same day. I will just whip out the HSA card and pay it with that.
Make sure you get one that has an out of pocket limit (I think they all have to have a limit--mine was $7000, so if something big happens you're out a max of 7K)
Scam. It incentivizes not going to the dr.
moron
Unless you're absolutely loaded... yes, you still need insurance.
Pretty sure you’re legally required to at least have a high deductible plan. Mine went up like $18/month but there were cheaper options that went up less, but everyone’s is different just a point of reference for whatever thats worth
Not anymore. Those penalties expired federally in 2018 and the state I am in does not have its own coverage mandate penalties far as I can tell.
Depending on how much you have set aside it can work, if you don't have anything set aside and break a leg in a freak accident you can get stuck making massive payments on $20,000+ of medical debt and set yourself back several years. I'm sure it's gotten more expensive now too, that was 6 years ago, and while I don't have the debt any more, I also have complications from the surgery that still bother me that I feel like I can't afford to get fixed.
That said, a high deductible plan can also leave you screwed, and doesn't save you as much money as they act like it does. The pricing is different for insured vs uninsured patients, and your insurance company has basically negotiated the rates higher so you think they're more useful than they actually are.
The pricing is different for insured vs uninsured patients,
This is a good point to consider. It's totally unfair, but providers can charge people without insurance basically whatever they want, a lot more money than they can charge people with insurance, because the ins. companies negotiate the max price that they can charge you.
If you're sure you won't have any accidents and emergencies next year it could be a good option, yes.
The biggest thing insurance does is limits risk. When you have insurance and get a big hospital bill, you generally have more bargaining power with the hospital than if you don't have insurance. When enrollment time comes run the numbers and look at the costs. You can also apply and review options on the health insurance marketplace which usually involves applying for Medicaid in the process. For kids under 18 Medicaid has a family income cap of like $8k/month so if you have kids they're definitely covered by Medicaid
Personally, I'm not sure what I'm going to do in 2026 if the subsidy isn't renewed. I'm an independent contractor so my health insurance options are entirely limited to the marketplace, and while I currently have a plan that costs $1250/month with the $1100/month subsidy I only pay $150/month for insurance which is quite reasonable. Every plan I saw on the marketplace cost a minimum of $900 or more per month.
I simply do not make enough (and I'm not allowed to work more hours than I currently am so that's not an option) to be able to afford insurance if the above math is the same for 2026. My plan right now is, keep job hunting and maybe my wife starts job hunting too since my contract work can work around the kids' school schedules (and my youngest starts going to school full time next year rather than half time) so we don't need a non-working parent as long as this contracting lasts for, and we probably won't get coverage through the marketplace in 2026 unless I can get it for about $400/month or less, because at that point I'm probably better off risking dumping more money into my emergency fund and hoping we don't have any medical emergencies (and planning on negotiating with the hospital if we do) I don't like the risk level of no insurance but we may simply be priced out of having insurance if the healthcare marketplace subsidy isn't renewed
"Bargaining power with the hospital" might be the most dystopian thing I've ever heard in my life.
Oh hospital billing is absolutely fucked up. Usually the bill you receive isn't itemized and simply requesting an itemized bill can be enough to knock some amoint off of the bill because even the hospitals billing staff are often not entirely certain exactly how they got that number they're now billing you for.
But yeah, anyone who does receive a large hospital bill, engage in some negotiations, ask for an itemized bill, state you will be paying the lower amount that is billed to insurance, advise that you're in a tough financial spot and ask what discounts or community care programs are available, and once all of that is done ask if you can settle for a lower amount by paying as a lump sum. My youngest's birth resulted in an $8k bill and ultimately the entire bill went away after a community care application (there were also some other unpaid bills that got forgiven because this hospital is horrible about actually sending bills, only ever sending statements that clearly say "this is not a bill" on them) so definitely use that bill as a starting point for negotiations!
Yeah, uh... We don't do any of that. Last time I was in a hospital my main concern was driving back to a different province with a bandage on my hand.
The only time I've ever paid anything for a hospital stay, other than prescription meds, is when I had to cover $40 for an ambulance call-out. And I billed that to my work because it was a workplace injury.
Look, I'm not trying to twist the knife here, I just really wish every American understood how completely insane their system is. It doesn't have to work like that. The words "negotiate with the hospital" do not ever have to be a part of your life.