The French Lesson in Health Care

But it's FRENCH. It's unacceptable as a system and it offends my American sensibilities. (Rename it with 'Patriot' or 'Freedom' instead of FRENCH and I'll endorse it whole-heartedly) >_>

As a Franco-American double-national, resident in France for nearly forty years... I usually find such articles to be oversimplified to the point of uselessness. But this one is actually quite good!

Dale, please tell me how France, in WWII helped us become the nation we are?  In addition, they fought here against the Brits. because they had so hatred the Brits. so much and wanted to stop

the British from further expanding their rule.

I am also 100% against our government meddling in any form of healthcare. Has no one learned that our leaders are corrupt and botch every plan because they want to know "what am I getting?".

It was a good article. I am a huge fan of the french healthcare system. But one thing they don't really talk that much about in the article is how it could be unsustainable. They mention at the end the national insurance is $13.5 billion in the red and has been in the red since 1985!

I have a feeling something like a national HSA plan is going to end up being the way to go. I've been using an HSA for the last couple years now and I love it! A government run HSA here in the US I think would do a lot of good. It would force people to save and the savings would be tax free, the premiums for HSA are substantially lower than an HMO (about half) and you get the coverage of a PPO. To me, having done it for the last couple years, it's a no brainer! HSA's are the way to go.

For those that don't know about them, basically, you get a yearly out of pocket deductable. Mine is $2000. So, for any medical expenses you incur, you pay 100% of the cost up to $2000 in one year. After you hit the $2000 mark, EVERYTHING is covered 100%.

Well, you might say, "that sucks, who has $2000!?!?!"... and this is where it gets good. Banks now have "HSA Bank Accounts". I have mine with Chase but most banks offer them. You are allowed to put up to $3000 a year into your HSA bank account TAX FREE (for now anyway, Obama is trying to do away with that). Once you get $2000 in the account, you can invest it in mutual funds just like a 401K or IRA. The money in this account is YOURS. They give you a Visa check card and you use that to pay for any medical expenses. AFter a couple years, you'll easily have maybe $1000 or $2000 in there... But you continue to pay into it every paycheck. So it just grows and grows...

But you will never have to spend more than $2000 out of it if you ever get really sick or have a medical emergency. And the money in the HSA bank account stays with you for life. It never goes away. And even if you leave the HSA plan, you can still use your HSA bank account to pay for medical expenses. And since you can invest the money, it can earn 10% or 12% on the open market!!! So it grows that much quicker.

For my example, at my company, the HMO cost the company $500 a month and was offered to employees free of charge. The PPO was $750 a month, and was offered to the employees at a fee of $250/month. The HSA PPO cost the company $250/month and was offered free of charge. So I took the $250/month I WAS paying for the PPO, and put it into the HSA account. After two years I have about $10,000 in there (I moved a bunch of the money into mutual funds). If I ever get really sick, I'll only have to pay $2000 max out of it before the insurance kicks in and covers everything. So I'm covered now no matter what.

No more of this 80/20 crap and no more co-pays. And the other interesting thing I've been finding out... most doctors and specialists will give you a pretty good discount if they know you are paying out of your own pocket (which you are when you use your HSA bank account). So now instead of $100 office visits, they are $45 for me. Funny how that works!!!

Anyway... I think the answer to our national healthcare problem might be to start a national HSA plan, with our premium coming out of the taxes we already pay!!! I'm sure it would get more complicated than what my situation is... but I think it would be good for all. We would all get to save and not feel like the money we pay for insurance just "disappears", we have a guarantee that 100% of major illnesses will be covered. And the government only has to pay for those that are really sick, everyone else is paying for themselves out of their HSA accounts... and then it helps the economy and stock market since everyone is saving money in their HSA accounts and investing that money in mutual funds.

If kids start doing an HSA when they are 18, by the time they are 50 and start having more serious health problems they'll have the money to pay for it. We might then be able to completely do away with medicare and have people just use their HSA accounts for health care when they get older.

Do a google search for a compounding interest calculator.

If you start with $0.00, and put $3000 in an investment account every year for 38 years (50yrs old - 18 yrs old = 38 yrs), if it yields an 8% return you'll have $660,000 by the time you are 50. If it only yields a 5% return you'll still have $323,000!!! OK, so lets say at 18 you can't really put $3000 into it every year, maybe only $1000 a year to start. If you do $1000 a year for 38 yrs at 5% it comes out to around $107,000, which is still really good and could handle paying for a lot of the health problems one might have as we get older.

Anyway...that's my $0.02. I don't understand why more people don't do an HSA PPO plan.

Also, for families, I didn't mention this... the deductible is usually higher depending on the number of dependents. It can be as low as $3500 for you and a spouse, or as much as $6000 or $7000 for a family of 5. BUT!!! you are then allowed to put more into your HSA savings account too. So after a couple years you'll have more than enough in the HSA bank account to cover your out of pocket expenses every year.