Health care costs in America have skyrocketed and the cost of insurance is getting out of control. First premiums went through the roof. Then deductible levels went sky-high. If you’re relatively healthy, you’re definitely spending more on insurance than you use. Have you thought about what it would be like if you didn’t have health insurance? Well, I’ve not only thought about it, I’ve done it. 2019 was my first year without health insurance and I’m doing it again in 2020. Listen to this podcast for some personal stories about why I chose to ignore the Affordable care Act’s Individual Mandate and go it alone.
Key Citations

* Rising Rate of Uninsured Americans: Kaiser Family Foundation
* Concentration of Health Spending in the Population: Peterson-KFF Health System Tracker

Transcript
Download the PDF
Welcome to The Powers Report Podcast. I am your host, Janis Powers. The show brings you candid, unique and data-driven perspectives on the health care industry. I believe that any solution that is going to positively impact the American health care system has to satisfy two major criteria: financial viability and behavioral incentive alignment. In other words, access to high quality care can only be achieved if we can afford it, and if we behave in ways that optimize our health. Please subscribe to our show on iTunes or on your preferred podcasting platform and connect with us on social media. Again, this is Janis Powers, and welcome to The Powers Report Podcast.
2020 brings a new year and a new decade. We’re well into January and many of you may have already forgotten your new year’s or even new decade’s resolutions. I hope not, because most resolutions tend to be things that promote better physical and mental well-being. We pledge to do things like exercise more, sleep more, eat a healthier diet. Many of us want to get our finances under control or pay down debt. Please take time to double down on these commitments if you don’t have a mechanism in place to remind you to do so.
I enter this year with less of a resolution and more of a continuing experiment. It will be my second year without health insurance. Actually, I should qualify that. I have health insurance but it’s not the kind that I’m legally supposed to have. I have a short-term catastrophic plan, and I’ll explain more of the details about it in a bit.
What I am supposed to have is dictated by the Affordable Care Act, or the ACA, which was passed in 2010. A decade ago. The major components of the law went into effect in 2014, so much of what I’m going to say may be old news to you. The ACA established the legal requirement that all Americans have health insurance. That’s the so-called individual mandate. I’m self-employed. I can’t get health insurance through an employer, which is the source of insurance for about half of all Americans. I’m not on Medicare or Medicaid, so I don’t qualify for the government’s public health programs. I have to buy health insurance on my own.
The market I’m in is small. There are about 330 million people in America. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, about 13.8 million people bought some sort of insurance – including non-ACA compliant plans – in 2018. Then throw in the number of people who are uninsured, which went up between 2017 and 2018. In 2018, according to the US Census Bureau, 27.5 million people didn’t have health insurance at all. I know I’m adding numbers from different sources which is kind of a no-no,