Costs Are Too High
With state-wide changes proposed in recent years in both California and Massachusetts, medical coverage has been topping the news - nationally and on a state level - and has become a major factor in upcoming elections. Unfortunately, even with many state-funded programs,
family health insurance is still out of reach for many lower-income families.
California's Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger offered his state a plan that made a splash in the media. He proposed a statewide plan expanding the Medi-Cal medical payment system, and imposing newer taxes on employers, hospitals and doctors to pay for additional subsidies.
Reason Magazine saw this as making Californians "wards of the state," but there haven't been many alternatives out there for lower-income families who want to provide their loved ones with medical coverage.
The "better way" that's suggested in the article states that "every Californian who can afford health insurance [should] buy at least enough to cover catastrophic medical expenses." But "the minimum health insurance benefit must be a $5,000 deductible plan with maximum out-of-pocket limits of $7,500 per person and $10,000 per family."
Facts on:
Family Health Insurance
Did you know...
A full 13% of all American families are known to live below the poverty line.
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However, with lower-income families making on average $30,000 dollars a year, paying out 1/3 of your yearly income for your family health insurance isn't feasible. A full 13% of all American families are known to live well below the poverty line; this means that 37.0 million people lived below the official poverty line in 2004, not including the millions of undocumented immigrants still straining the medical system. The poverty rate in the US could be described as one of the worst among the post-industrialized developed world, and this is the true reason why so many people can't afford the rising costs of family health insurance.
Until health insurance premiums mirror American incomes, there won't be a "better way" to pay for medical coverage. In the mean time, parents will have to keep shopping online and compare health insurance plans at third-party sites for
affordable family health insurance in an effort to protect their families in a time of need.
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