I don't know why, but I do feel the need to chime in here. I can join Todd in saying I am now uninsured. After years of paying over $2,000 a month for horrible health care, I hit a slow spot in my job and couldn't keep it up. I wanted to swith to a high deductable, but guess what. No one will cover my son or wife under that type of policy. Its either the group policy of just under $2,000 a month or nothing. The joke was when they told me they wouldn't cover my wife because she never had surgery for her endimeitriosis. Same company that kept her from getting the same surgery for the last 3 years we had the policy.
I thought about putting her back on until after the surgery, but realized they would fight me so long I might as well just pay cash for it since it probably will be less than the premiums.
Like Todd probably can, I can pay for most of my health care needs. What is scary is if something real bad happens. That means I will probably be forced into bankruptcy. If the government really wanted to help the uninsured public, they would simply impliment a high end casulty policy for all americans, based off of your yearly income. For those making little or no money, they would pay a small copay or cap and be covered for the rest. For those of us making a little more, we may be faced with paying 10% of our annual income. That means a family making $20,000 is responsible for the first $2,000 of their care each year, and so on. We all get to chose our primary doctors. We all would shop around to get the best price. Seems to me it is more reasonable then telling people to just pay up to the breaking point and then making them go bankrupt.