health insurance
My wife and i are retired and collecting a pension from our emplooyer. we are not medicare eligible, i will not be at all, she will be in 5 years. what is everyone using for healthcare?
Forum Discussion
- I am retired and have good coverage from a state run system for teachers. It is a merging of the state system and medicare. Definitely not free. The medicare part is around $100/month and the state part is maybe 200 or so. My wife is covered under the same system but not subsidized so our total bill must be over $400. Also, there is considerable out-of-pocket. Not complaining considering the medical care we've had. I think we could come close to the premiums with something like blue-cross but without some of the guaranteed coverage and unlimited amount, etc.
- Really?
If you don't get SS benefits does that exclude you from Medicare?
jesseannie - I worked for the state so i never paid social security. my pensiion is through the state retirement system. my wife did pay into soscial security so i can get madicare through her even through i did not pay in/ if so is it at a subsidential cost
- I too am curious why you wouldn't be eligible for Medicare come age 65. Even if you didn't work, you can be covered if you were married to someone who does qualify for more than 10 years. There are many rules and provisions to medicare, so it would pay to get professional help. And even if there is no way for you to qualify, you can still buy in at a premium much lower than private insurance provided you are a legal US citizen.
As for current coverage, you might very well qualify for premium assistance under the ACA unless you make a significant income. If that is the case, premiums for people in their 50s and 60s are just plain expensive, even with sky high deductibles. And if there was actually an easy fix, even our completely inept legislative and executive branches of government would have gotten it accomplished. But healthcare is wildly expensive and free lunches don't exist. Like Whack-A-Mole, trying to fix one area will just cause another huge problem to pop up. - We were self employed for decades. Health insurance is one hot mess in the US.
We are now on Medicare but before we turned 65, we were paying over $2000/mo and had high deductibles so most years add on another $3-5K out of pocket.
What don’t you qualify for Medicare? If you need more contribution go back to work.
If you have the income bite the bullet. If not, work until your 65.
