My Experience with Obamacare

In many of the articles I’ve read and discussions I’ve participated in concerning Obamacare, rarely do I talk to someone whose objections are based on personal experience. I thought it might be educational to discuss my actual personal experience signing up for insurance through the Affordable Healthcare Act.

Let me start by saying that I’m a so-called “job creator”. I’ve launched 5 companies over the last 20 years. In 2003 I a created the first competitive intelligence tool for email marketers and 11 years later eDataSource is still one of the leading companies in it’s space.

A few years ago, I made the decision to launch a new company out of my home, but one of the biggest obstacles I faced had nothing to do with starting a new venture, but how to simply get affordable health insurance.

At the time I was able to get on Cobra and I was paying around $600 a month for that. But in researching health insurance for a sole proprietor, I found that options were few and very expensive. The cheapest plan I could find was going to cost me over $1,100 a month!

I had another issue that many of us face. I had gone through a marital separation. It was amicable and before long both myself and my ex spouse had found new love interests and were in committed relationships. The problem was: we couldn’t finalize our divorce.

My ex-wife had a pre-existing condition. Like many women, my ex is a cancer survivor. The result was that we could not officially get divorced because she would not be able to get coverage on her own as a result of pre-existing conditions.

The day the Supreme Court upheld the provisions of the Affordable Healthcare Act, my ex and I were finally able to finalize our divorce and she was able to re-marry shortly after.

In December I was one of the first to sign up for Obamacare. Fortunately I was able to use the New York Healthcare site which worked without a problem. It was easy to sign up and I settled on a Platinum Plan that costs slightly less than I was paying on Cobra.

In February, I decided to downgrade slightly to a Silver plan. The deductibles were higher, but I felt I was paying the deductible “upfront” with the platinum plan, so the Silver plan reduced my payments to around $385 a month, or around a third less than I had been paying under Cobra and $800 less a month then I was looking at without Obamacare.

As an entrepreneur I have witnessed first hand people trapped in jobs and marriages they didn’t want to be in only because they were concerned they would lose their healthcare coverage. That fear prevented many people from pursuing their dreams and aspirations and made them a slave to companies who held them hostage because they could not get coverage elsewhere or trapped in marriages that could not end without severe hardship to one of the partners.

As a job creator I applaud the Affordable Healthcare act because I believe it truly allows people to pursue a better life for themselves and to take a chance on running their own business without worry of being ruined due to a healthcare concern.

That, anyway, has been my experience. It was easy, it was simple, and I’m paying much less for coverage than I ever did. By the way, my business is thriving. I just may have to hire more people!