I Could Qualify For SCHIP!

I just phoned California’s SCHIP program, Healthy Families, and found that my family could qualify.

This is the scenario I laid out:
· Husband, age 62 (which I’ll be in 2-years), collecting early Social Security; Wife, age 41;
· Two minor dependent children, ages 2 and 7;
· Currently covered under self-paid individual health insurance (incidentally, costing about $10,000 a year, HMO, with $35 doctor visits and 30% co-insurance payments for other services, formulary Rx’s $20 generic and $35 brand);
· Mutual fund capital gains of $50,000 and ordinary dividends of $30,000;
· Earned income of $2289 a month by wife at job without medical benefits. (My wife is not currently working, being a house-mom.)

Thus, even though having substantial liquid assets, saved through a lifetime of scrimping in order to fund retirement, I would qualify for California’s Healthy Families SCHIP program. Assets and unearned income (e.g., Social Security, capital gains, ordinary dividends) do not count against SCHIP qualification.

We live in one of the highest cost areas of the U.S., San Diego, owning a modest house in a middle-class neighborhood, with substantial equity. We drive two old, almost 100,000-mile cars, paid off. We can’t afford baby-sitters in order to go out, so we don’t, and we eat out once a week at a fast-food restaurant. Pasta is a staple on our table. We don’t have a cell phone or broadband, saving about $100 a month on those common conveniences. We do not have pensions.

What could we do with an extra $10,000 a year, if we didn’t have to pay insurance premiums, and instead SCHIP and taxpayers picked up the tab? Fix-up the 24-year old house; Buy a new or recent car; Hire baby sitters and get some additional sanity from entertainment; Eat better than at Jack or the Clown; Put steaks on the table; Have a cellphone, at least for emergencies, and faster downloads; and so on.

We make choices, in favor of frugality and self-responsibility, and can thus afford to continue to pay insurance premiums.

Sure, it’s not easy being a parent, or living in a high-cost area. Sure, it would be nice to live easier. But, is that fair to other struggling taxpayers?

SCHIP should include reasonable asset tests. In all but three states, it doesn’t have any.