| Updated: 11/10/2008 9:59 pm |
Published: 11/07/2008 8:24 pm
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An estimated 46 million Americans are living on the edge, one accident or one serious illness away from financial disaster. Tonight we begin with a focus on your money – the high cost of health coverage and a mammoth challenge ahead for President-elect Barack Obama.
If you’ve had to go to a doctor recently, you know how expensive that visit can be if you don’t have health insurance. An employer-sponsored health plan is no longer a guarantee as more companies look for ways to cut costs.
At the Meineke Car Care Center in Broken Arrow, co-owner John Price fixes another noisy muffler. If only he could so easily quiet the concerns surrounding something exceedingly important to him and his employees – health insurance.
“It’s cost prohibitive, says Price. “My employees can’t afford it and I certainly couldn’t pass the cost, especially in these economic times, onto the customer.”
With just 15 employees, there aren’t enough people to spread out the risk and keep premiums low. So he and his partner came up with a solution.
“We have found some websites we direct our employees to and some local providers and we reimburse part of their premium payment that way,” says Price.
The premium, he says, is only about $150 a month for individual coverage, compared to more than $500 for an employer-sponsored group plan.
