ACA changes

[Ticker]

I attended a town hall meeting with senator bill cassidy this morning, and it is rapidly becoming apparent that all federally funded health care will soon be changing, like it or not. every option that he envisioned has recipitants paying more, both in out of pocket expenses and deductibles; the use of health care savings accounts will be the core of the plans. he made it sound like neither medicare nor medicaid will be spared. much of the costs of coverage will be shifted to the individual states, and will surely result in higher taxation.

My question to this group is have any of you started making financial changes or plans to prepare for these changes? If so, would you please share so that we can see how your strategy might help us decide on the right path to take to survive the changes?

 

[razztazz]

I have been doing it my whole life. Save money. Don't spend any. Be happy with less.

 

[FUEGO]

It's uncertain what changes we'll ultimately see to the ACA. We pay virtually nothing for a superb plan right now ($16/month for $100 deductible, $5 copays). Under the House's passed version of ACA our costs will go up around $4000 I'm guessing (higher premiums, more out of pocket costs).

That's roughly a 10% change in our annual budget, so no big deal in the grand scheme of things (we planned on having fat in the budget).

I don't expect the eventual AHCA (if it even passes and gets signed into law) will be quite as severe as the House version, and the House version won't really kick in the higher premiums till 2020. I'm not changing any of my spending plans or budget right now since we're still 2.5+ years away and there's so much uncertainty.

 

[MRG]

I don't know what the weather is going to be tomorrow. How am I going to know what the new insurance is going to be?

Today my phone said it was going to rain at 3:15 PM. I went outside then and it wasn't raining. Heck it didn't rain till 3:30.

I'm letting my representatives know my thoughts. What else can you do?

 

[MichaelB]

See this thread for the most recent discussion of the AHCA http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f38/are-we-allowed-to-talk-about-it-yet-86618.html