Open enrollment
 

I assume everyone is either going through or coming up on their open enrollment period for health care in 2016. I just started going through mine, and noticed my medical, dental and vision increased $225.00 a month. I saw some mention of other increases embedded in other threads and was curious what the cross section of increases look like throughout our industry.

JetBlue rates:

2016 rates. ? Life is Better in Blue

Cheapest plan for family is $333/mo medical, plus $73.50/mo dental, and $19.34 vision. Total $425.84/mo cheapest option.

If you go for the plan with an HSA it is $421/mo plus the dental/vision.

This is what happens when people want the government involved. Paying a lot more for the same or worse coverage. Rates have always gone up, but nothing like they have lately.

Several states have had large health care insurers collapse or get de certified putting hundreds of thousands out of insurance completely.

Thanks a lot to the fine folks who thought this was a good idea.

You should probably check the last sentence of your first paragraph. If anyone's premiums are going up substantially it's a weakness in that groups collective bargaining agreement and it's just the company shifting more of the cost onto the employees even if the overall rates didn't increase that much or at all. At spirit the company can raise our premiums a max of 7% a year. Guess what they go up 7% each year and plan premiums overall (company+employee) have not increased that much

Virgin America is self-insuring for next year with Anthem, so for 2016 our premiums did not go up for any of the Classic PPO, Wellness PPO, or HMO options.

We need less profit motive in healthcare (and prisons and military).

You can look this stuff up you know.

"The United States health care system is the most expensive in the world, but ..."the U.S. underperforms relative to other countries on most dimensions of performance. Among the 11 nations studied in this report—Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States—the U.S. ranks last, as it did in the 2010, 2007, 2006, and 2004. "

http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror

Is there a place to find out what the company pays for our health insurance. I've heard somewhere they cover 2/3 of the cost but that may just be rumor.

Wow that is expensive. Cheapest PPO plan here for family is 265.56/month medical, 33.90/month dental, and 23 vision. Total 322.46/month.

Let's hope we wind up with your benefits department when the merger happens ;)

At all the airlines I've worked at my costs have gone up every year. Same with everyone in my family's and friends insurance I've asked about it, each one of them whether in private or government sector has their health care choice either taken away or the premiums increase. One of my friends who is a teacher had all their plans taken away completely and the only option was a HSA with $10,000 out of pocket max for the year. She was pregnant and had to pay $10K. I fully expect to pay a bit more each year, but my problem is the massive increases and chances since the implementation of obamacare.

Even the 425 isn't that bad compared to $746 I'm going to be shelling out. I think I'm gonna be ill.

The problem is you are trying to make the argument purely political. Ever think that these massive corporations (any sector) have been on a cost cutting and productivity binge since 2008. Because the healthcare system and insurance is unreasonably confusing for most people it's easy for these companies to use Obamacare as a scapegoat for premium increases. They don't even have to say that's why, people just assume which is normally not correct. It's the company shifting cost.

Wait, you mean "for profit" business doesn't just let government eff it in the rear? Who could have imagined that?

Yes Yes. Big bad government. Big bad corporate big wigs. Its not Obama's fault this country is fat and and can't understand what an occasional trip to the gym might do for you. Everyone hates welfare. Unless its the welfare of healthcare as they put there obesity on the backs of those of us who are smart enough to fathom calories in calories out. Everyone who scoffs at being told bacon is bad for you. Start looking in the mirror before you cry about anyone but yourself causing healthcare costs to rise.

It's political b/c the gov't is fining the companies for offering plans that are "too good" in the government's eyes i.e. cadillac plan. People who's contracts continue into 2018 are seeing affects quicker b/c there isn't any negotiating in contracts before hand. Learn what the affordable health care act does regarding fines and you'll know why it's political.

Thank the communist egomaniac in the white house for making oh so "affordable."

What is being called a "cadillac" plan now is totally laughable.

I guess if you are in a non-"cadillac" plan, Flav-o-Flav drives you to the morgue.

Please don't interject facts into the irrational butthurt by FTF. It's more fun to blame someone else or the government than to accept reality.

Wow, the ignorance runs deep in this one! :rolleyes:

Care to enlighten us?

If you need 'enlightenment' on the subject...I'd say the ignorance runs too deep for you as well.

How true. But I can't help suggesting they Google the origins of Obamacare. Maybe they'll learn something.

At Alaska this year, they are encouraging everyone to sign up for the HSA plan which requires a high deductible. If I stick to my old PPO plan the premium will be $189 twice a month. If I opt for the HSA plan the cost drops to $109 twice a month. The deductible increases to $4000 per family per year. But the company give us $3000 to fund the account. With the monthly savings and the company contribution, the $4000 deductible is covered.

It seems too generous to be true. I'm still looking for the downside.

I used to be at ASA when they introduced the HSA. 2008 or 2009 I think. Anyway, same thing the HSA was lower premium wise, higher deductible and such but with the money the company kicked in it was actually a much better option than the traditional option.

So, maybe it's true haha

HSAs are pretty sweet tax shelters too. I'd go for it.

No they are not. No one is getting taxed on their "Cadillac" plan this year or next, or even the one after that. The rate increase has nothing to do with that.

My regional was self insured through the same. It was wonderful. Low cost compared to others, and much, much better coverage. Most offices I visited had never seen coverage like we had.

One thing Virgin has going for it is, having a large amount of SFO employees, they tend to be fairly healthy over, say, the Midwest and Southern folks (diet wise).

While those costs do add up, the very high costs are coming from long term illnesses where doctors pretty much have a duty to "throw everything at you".

From the beginning, when lots of unneeded tests are done to cover their negligent lawsuit check box, to the end where you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to extend life by several months (at best) in a painful state of existence. Steve Jobs succumbed and how much do you think he spent on his medical care? My guess is in the tens of millions, at that point you have nothing to lose, and you can't take it with you.

Technology has reduced the costs of almost every sector except the healthcare system in the US.

We need more of a "take charge" type mentality to healthcare where people shop around to truly reduce costs, it's just impossible to do, really. It's not like you can call around for a kidney transplant like you do a set of tires.

The overall increases over the past 16 years have been mostly linear (not exponential) and the ACA "Obama Care" act has done little to increase premiums on a % basis. BUT, everyone is quick to blame those of the other party who have actually done something that has helped Americans.


http://www.ohio.com/polopoly_fs/1.33...nsure12web.jpg

Same at spirit. The high deductible plan is a $4500 deductible but the company kicks in $3000 toward it into a HRA. HRA is similar to an HSA but it's not investable. It does roll over so if you don't use it and you get another $3000 added you could have your entire deductible covered and then some left over for other expenses when the plan pays a 90/10 split after the deductible is met. It's still a PPO and the savings over the expensive plan are $3600 a year in premiums. All these numbers a based on being on the family level. It is however bad for prescriptions so if we needed something regularly I might not recommend it. Otherwise no brainer IMO

Not really any downside to it. With your savings from your premium difference, you can put another $1920 into your HSA for a total of $4920. I don't even know how you could lose with them giving you $3000. Plus every year you don't use it all, you can save it for the future.

I think these HSA plans also do a good job promoting people to take an even more active role in staying healthy, since they can bank the savings for the future and the funds are eligible for medicare premiums.

With the contributions being tax free and the interest gains from investing it also tax free, you have the benefits of a traditional and ROTH retirement accounts combined.

The only main difference with the HRA is that the money isn't usually yours to keep when you separate from your company. If you have a choice between the two, you almost always want to go with an HSA over and HRA. Depending on how your prescription out-of-pocket max works, you may have a separate amount to hit, while the HSA applies towards your deductible/out-of-pocket max.

The solution to high healthcare costs should start with price transparency by medical providers. It is anticompetitive to require small insurance companies to pay a higher price for the same medical procedure. It serves as a barrier to entry and reduces competition. Large insurance companies, small insurance companies, uninsured patients, and insured patients should all be able to pay the same amount for a medical procedure. The healthcare providers should be required to post the costs of each of their medical procedures so that consumers can search based on cost and on quality. Capitalism doesn't work for the consumer without price and product transparency. Airlines are legally required to post their prices with all taxes included and in specific sized font.

If you read my post I said exactly that, til 2018.

I think the frustration comes from all the lies during the sales job. Lower family premiums by avg of $2500. Remember that? There really is absolutely NO truth in politics anymore. All politicians lie through their teeth to get what they want.

That claim was based on a single payer system. Unfortunately, republicans wanted this convoluted system we have now that didn't really do anything different than what we had before. To the dems credit we are covering 20-30 million more people with a lot more coverage in general than we had before (ie preexisting condition clauses), so that is nice.

It was done this way because Obama wanted to compromise. Look where that gets you.

http://www.downeyobesityreport.com/w...ure-chart1.jpghttps://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=...46657868146017
Nice Chart

It's certainly easy to blame the fatties on our healthcare costs. But the reality is, the largest by far increases are in the long term illnesses. Spending on cancer alone is expected to double between 2010-2020, to almost $160 bil annually. You don't see obesity causing an increase anywhere near that, if anything it is linear with the increase in obesity in general.

There was a long term study done in Europe detailing the cost of smokers on their healthcare system. What they found was that up until the mid-50's, smokers greatly outspent their non-smoking counterparts. After that, the smokers quickly succumbed to their illnesses while the non-smokers developed expensive long term illnesses that overall pushed their spending above the smokers in the long term ($326,000 vs $417,000, respectively).

In fact, did you know a study was done here in the US showed for every pack of cigarettes smoked, there was a net savings of $0.32 on lowered costs for Medicare, social security, pensions, etc.

http://mchb.hrsa.gov/whusa08/hstat/h...es/204csLs.gif

Pointing fingers at a select group of individuals without knowing the whole picture doesn't result in a correct "big picture" view, IMO.

There were not any 20-30 million insured. They barely made 7 and that's assuming that was accurate.

"Pointing fingers at a select group of individuals without knowing the whole picture doesn't result in a correct "big picture" view, IMO."

Don't really call 68% of the population a select group.

Directly from the Gov maybe, I'm not sure what that latest figure is. Remember the ACA allowed many people access to even private employer coverage who were previously not able to obtain coverage due to other issues.