Today my boss informed me that our Health Reimbursement Account(HRA) would end on December 14, 2014, so I better schedule my remaining health expenses to a date before the 14th. To help with the increased after-tax health costs they will be increasing my paycheck in 2015. Although it is not as nice as the Health Reimbursement Account they recommended that I set up a Health Savings Account. Awhile back I wrote a post, Affordable Care Act Loser #7 – Health Reimbursement Account, that explained that the Affordable Care Act and the Department of Labor had effectively outlawed the HRA. Their decision is a sad reminder that “common sense” and Affordable Care Act do not belong in the same sentence. Although my company is making a best effort attempt to overcome the Affordable Care Act dysfunctionality, the bottom line is that I will be paying a larger part of my health insurance costs than if I had a HRA. So while I will receive a pay increase, the net result after paying for health care with after-tax money is that I just took a pay cut. Anybody wonder why the nine most terrifying words in the English language are, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” I keep wondering how we reform health care when the HHS is at war with the healthy people. It looks like a strategy that was born to fail. It is as if the Health and Human Services mission statement should say, “Making Health Care Less Affordable and Harder to Get One Policy At A Time”.
