So grateful for the ACA

[Dtail]

Weren't you still in your low 60's when the ACA came out? And then your wife?

Marko has a bit more money than the typical current posters here.

 

[GenXguy]

Marko has a bit more money than the typical current posters here.

But that shouldn't prevent access to ACA plans, just no subsidies, which isn't uncommon for someone with a higher income.

 

[athena53]

One thing that might be interesting is if there is a specific aspect of the ACA that people found most helpful. For me, hands down, it was guaranteed access.

Absolutely. Few of us reach our 50s and early 60s without some quirks in our medical records no matter how hard we work at staying healthy. I retired at 61. Was I thrilled at the ever-increasing premium (doubled in 4 years, no subsidies), the ever-decreasing networks and the $6K deductible? No, but I was darn grateful to be covered for the Scary Stuff- and also darn grateful I didn't have any Scary Stuff over those years.

 

[RetireRay]

We love the ACA as well. Without it, I wouldn’t have been able to retire at 53 years old, (6 years ago). We’ve invested well, and are frugal, which has helped us build our nest egg. So glad the ACA is available for us, as we both have pre-existing conditions. We’ll never forget which political party fought for this, and have fought to keep it in place.

 

[USGrant1962]

I definitely appreciate the guaranteed access. But the "affordable" part of the name ACA is a bit of a misnomer unless you are subsidized by other taxpayers. My corporate plan cost jumped when ACA went into effect, and in ER we are now paying about $15K a year for an unsubsidized bronze plan (2 of us) with astronomical deductibles and OOP max. It's a good thing we are healthy.

 

[marko]

Weren't you still in your low 60's when the ACA came out? And then your wife?

I haven't been in the low sixties since 1978.

Oh! You mean age?

I'm not sure what an ACA plan would do without the subsidy. We just converted our company BCBS to a private pay family plan. Regardless, water under the bridge.

 

[RetiredHappy]

I was only able to use ACA subsidies for one year, when I was 54, before my husband's SS kicked in and other income which made me too "wealthy" to get subsidies. So from 55 to 65, I am paying full frieght for my health insurance via private off-exchange individual insurance. I have 4 more years of that before Medicare kicks in and I get a raise! Still, I am grateful that ACA is a fallback plan for alot of people with pre-existing conditions.

 

[Unpaintedhuffhines]

One thing that might be interesting is if there is a specific aspect of the ACA that people found most helpful. For me, hands down, it was guaranteed access.

Absolutely.

In 2004 I was laid off from my dot com gig (in the US and A). Was a tough time to find a job, so was out for about 9 months. Wanting to avoid cost of COBRA, I applied for private insurance (much cheaper). One question was "have you ever had migraines?" for my 8-year-old son, I checked "yes," because I was told to tell the truth. He had 5-6 migraines, and doc said "yeah, this happens with kids. He'll likely grow out of it." (he did).

The acceptance letter was "everyone is covered 100% except for your son. We will not cover anything related to the brain or central nervous system." Ridiculous. So, we stayed on Cobra.

Similar circumstance about 5 years ago. Signed up, got immediate guaranteed coverage. Without ACA, only the people that need insurance will be denied. While it is far from perfect, I'm a fan to say the least.

 

[ownyourfuture]

I'm even more grateful for the HSA available to those with HD plans.

 

[GenXguy]

I'm not sure what an ACA plan would do without the subsidy. We just converted our company BCBS to a private pay family plan. Regardless, water under the bridge.

I see. You chose not to get a marketplace plan rather than not having access to it. I wondered about that not having access part. Many people don't get subsidies, especially before the more recent change to temporarily provide subsidies for even higher incomes than previously.

 

[pb4uski]

We were on ACA from when ACA started until we turned 65 in 2020. We were very lucky that we lived in one of the few states that prohibits age rating so we were able to buy a catastrophic plan that was really similar to a bronze plan for $267/month each (2020). Luckily we were healthy so we have negligible claims but the plan did give us access to negotiated rates for medical services and coverage if we had a significant health issue.

My pet peeve with health insurance is how we have it tied to employment so if you change jobs your health insurance changes.... why? I see it with my son when he changes jobs and needs to go on ACA for a month or two until the coverage with the new employer starts. It's crazy. We would all be better off if we divorced health insurance from employment and made health insurance like other personal insurances like car, home, life, etc. where if you change jobs it doesn't impact your insurance one iota. We could still offer subsidies as we do now to make it more affordable and employers could provide a benefit to employees by contributing to the coverage.

 

[marko]

I see. You chose not to get a marketplace plan rather than not having access to it. I wondered about that not having access part. Many people don't get subsidies, especially before the more recent change to temporarily provide subsidies for even higher incomes than previously.

TBH I wasn't aware that a marketplace plan was available to me. I thought that since I was way over the income limit that I was on my own. Having said that I likely would've gone the same route that I did.

 

[ShokWaveRider]

Helped up RE for sure. Hopefully it remains and gets better so other may benefit as we did.

 

[big-papa]

I too have used it and am glad it is available.


The only complaint is that when it started the insurance companies were pretty bad and so were the plans. The current plans are not that great either, but a bit better than before.

I would say likewise, at least here in TX. I was on an ACA Marketplace plan its first year as I was between jobs. Of course the rollout of the website was legendary, but the plan I chose was OK, but not great. It was a PPO plan, but those have gone the way of the dodo bird at least in the Lone Star state.

Back on it this year after retiring and am pretty happy with the EPO plan I chose so far. A few minor annoying things but no more than I had with employer sponsored plans over the years. DW goes on medicare in 2025 and me in 2026. Only question now is how well did I guesstimate my MAGI? Will find out, but so far it looks like I overestimated. Definitely more out of pocket for premiums than I was paying while working, but significantly less than when I was on COBRA for the last few months of last year.

Cheers
Big Papa

 

[Onda]

One thing that might be interesting is if there is a specific aspect of the ACA that people found most helpful. For me, hands down, it was guaranteed access.

Most helpfull compared to what? Before ACA there was nothing. Hmm in the way you are saying that.

 

[FLSUnFIRE]

One thing that might be interesting is if there is a specific aspect of the ACA that people found most helpful. For me, hands down, it was guaranteed access.

Predictability, with the ACA I knew I could get some insurance and what it would cover and have an idea of the likely cost by watching the plans on healthcare.gov. PTC is nice but if I were working poor instead of weathy-poor, it would be a lifesaver. The plan I'm on now cost about as much as my FEHB plan if you ignore the subsidies on both and look at the full cost... actually was a bit cheaper one year so I feel that the pricing is "fair" but also that healthcare payment system is still severely inefficient and broken overall with lots of bad incentives and poor transparency with so many parties involved with competing interests.

 

[audreyh1]

We also paid full freight on ACA so Medicare seems like a bargain even with some IRMAA.

We already had coverage and pretty good PPO plans, but not cheap. After ACA switch it got quite a cheaper for a few years then PPO plans went away and prices started going up again but probably slower than it would have otherwise.

 

[big-papa]

Most helpfull compared to what? Before ACA there was nothing. Hmm in the way you are saying that.

There were plans around. They required underwriting and were extremely expensive.

 

[socca]

There were plans around. They required underwriting and were extremely expensive.

Required underwriting: YES

Extremely expensive: NO

Rewind the clock to 2007. My medical insurance premiums were about $80 / month (that's not a typo ). The coverage was comparable to what I was getting from a mega-corp plan the year before.

Skyrocketing premiums began (for non-subsidized folks) when the [A]CA was enacted. I was only on the [A]CA for 1.5 years before I went back to purchasing non-[A]CA medical insurance. My premium for a non-[A]CA policy today is $360 / month. For an [A]CA policy it would be over $900 / month.

I'm interested only in data. I'm not going to squabble about the politics associated with the [A]CA.

 

[ShokWaveRider]

Required underwriting: YES

Extremely expensive: NO

Assuming you could actually get it! Prior to ACA my wife or I HAD to keep working as No company would insure me at that time because of my High BP, even though it was controlled by Medication, or we "both" would have retired 5 - 10 years earlier. My DW worked for a few years extra till the ACA kicked in.

 

[Dtail]

Required underwriting: YES

Extremely expensive: NO

Rewind the clock to 2007. My medical insurance premiums were about $80 / month (that's not a typo ). The coverage was comparable to what I was getting from a mega-corp plan the year before.

Skyrocketing premiums began (for non-subsidized folks) when the [A]CA was enacted. I was only on the [A]CA for 1.5 years before I went back to purchasing non-[A]CA medical insurance. My premium for a non-[A]CA policy today is $360 / month. For an [A]CA policy it would be over $900 / month.

I'm interested only in data. I'm not going to squabble about the politics associated with the [A]CA.

Depends where one lives and how the MAGI is managed.
In 2018, paid 67 monthly for a PPO plan.

 

[audreyh1]

Required underwriting: YES

Extremely expensive: NO

Rewind the clock to 2007. My medical insurance premiums were about $80 / month (that's not a typo ). The coverage was comparable to what I was getting from a mega-corp plan the year before.

Skyrocketing premiums began (for non-subsidized folks) when the [A]CA was enacted. I was only on the [A]CA for 1.5 years before I went back to purchasing non-[A]CA medical insurance. My premium for a non-[A]CA policy today is $360 / month. For an [A]CA policy it would be over $900 / month.

I'm interested only in data. I'm not going to squabble about the politics associated with the [A]CA.

Ours before ACA was way more expensive than that.

ACA dropped the price considerably for each of us.

 

[big-papa]

Ours before ACA was way more expensive than that.

ACA dropped the price considerably for each of us.

Yep, that was the experience of many of my colleagues who retired before ACA showed up and before they were eligible for medicare.

 

[statsman]

Ours before ACA was way more expensive than that.

ACA dropped the price considerably for each of us.

My megacorp's Under-65 retiree medical plan was even cheaper than that through 2010. Starting in 2011, the monthly premiums started spiking upward. My first year on the plan was in 2017, and it had gotten a great deal more expensive than in 2010, but worst case (premiums plus MaxOOP) remained a bit better than any of the ACA plans. But by this year, that delta has almost disappeared.

What was once a retirement "perk" became merely convenience. I suspect these types of plans were the ones most impacted negatively by ACA from a cost standpoint.

 

[cyber888]

I too, am so grateful, for our ACA Insurance. I retired last year, and went straight to the ACA market, and paid $0. The subsidy covered the Bronze package we got.
We are very healthy and we only used it for our Yearly Health check up. I think our co-pay (DW and I) was around $80.