Health Insurance: Looking Back -- And Ahead
Michael Taft, 60, Is Well Served As a Federal Employee
Each year, many of us make choices about our health insurance. See how life and their health plans affected some people this year and how that will reflect in 2008 selections. We'll check back with some of them in the coming year to see how their choices work out. Select an image to the left to read more. | |||||||||||
Compared with most workers, federal employees have it pretty good when it comes to health benefits, and Michael Taft knows it. "I'm very well cared for as a federal civil servant," says Taft, who oversees the archives at the Library of Congress's American Folklife Center. Taft has been with Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of the Mid-Atlantic States, an HMO, for nearly seven years. He pays a $310 monthly premium for insurance covering himself and his wife. The plan, he says, has low out-of-pocket payments and the "drug coverage is good." The feds pick up about 72 percent of premium costs, and next year workers will pay only 2.9 percent more on average for their share of the premium, or $2.73 more on a biweekly basis. They also have far more options than most workers. The only thing Taft doesn't like, as a citizen of both the United States and Canada, is the idea that such benefits are not available to all. "The Canadian system is not perfect," the Silver Spring resident says. "There are waits, but everyone is even. The Canadian system allows you to go to any doctor; there's no paperwork, no fuss." Taft will stick with Kaiser next year, paying $13.78 more a month for the coverage. His grade : B+ for his Kaiser coverage | |||||||||||
