Irregular Payments

New here and like what you read? Subscribe to my RSS feed for more. And thanks for visiting!

photo credit: StreetFly JZ

As expected, we suffered a little setback in debt reduction progress this month when a batch of medical bills arrived. And just as expected, there is no such thing as a cheap medical procedure, so of course we maxed out my wife’s portion of the deductible. Since the deductible on the plan I get through work is fairly high, well, likewise our final bill.

The first obvious lesson is that going without health insurance in this day and age is a sure route to financial ruin. I’m not thrilled with a fairly large bill, but it could have been far larger had we been without coverage!

And since health insurance was forefront in our minds, the wife and I decided to do a little comparison shopping to see what it would cost to get a decent policy on our own. One with perhaps a better deductible. Maybe look into a HSA to get a little tax advantage. That sort of thing.

We used the health coverage comparison engine at eHealthInsurance to look into a pretty broad range of policies. One things was obvious from the get go: we could — assuming we qualify for the plans, of course — get health insurance for a heck of a lot cheaper than what my employer is currently paying on us. Especially after an upcoming rate increase goes into effect.

I broached the subject of dropping us from the group coverage and instead getting a salary increase on par with the plan’s premium with my employer, and he certainly didn’t rule the idea out. So yesterday we submitted an application to see if we could qualify for one of the mid-range plans that meets our needs, halves our deductible(!), and qualifies as an HSA plan to boot.

Anyway, enough rambling for today. On to the raw numbers:

While I am certainly no fan of the tactics of many in the credit card industry, sometimes I’m not so sure we don’t get precisely what we deserve. For instance, in public comments to regulators on their credit card gripes, we see one commenter lamenting, apparently, the reality of time passing:

I agree that 30 days late is late — one day is not late!

Has our education system gotten so poor that we cannot even grasp simple words like late anymore?

late: Coming, occurring, or remaining after the correct, usual, or expected time; delayed

photo credit: Renegade98

With our own government muddling our minds by telling us that a loan is a credit via the recently passed Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, is it any wonder that Americans seem a bit economically challenged? Oh, sure, at least it’s an interest free loan, but as long as you have to pay it back, it sure is not a credit to this taxpayer.

And yes, I know you could play a little arbitrage and come out with a little extra coin in the end. But you and I both know that the majority of people taking advantage of this are not going to be doing that. They are going to be blowing it on some other thing they cannot really afford but for this $7,500 advance from the government. And then in a couple years they will discover they owe that money back, and be further in the hole than before. Could you please explain the logic in helping those with debt problems by giving them extra debt? All while sacking everyone — including future generations — with a little more debt via a nice little boost to the deficit? (Oh, that’s right, this isn’t a helping hand for citizens — it is for the banks.)

On a personal note, I am so looking forward to answering the inevitable client questions from those who take advantage of this as to why they need to pay an additional $500 in taxes, every year, for the next 15 years…

I propose a new law:

Congress shall enact no new spending legislation during an election year.