It’s not necessarily going to be the 55-64 year-old crowd that will be the most costly for state exchange insurers. Try the 20-54 year-old crowd, the Gen Y portion of whom the exchanges are courting to sign up to avoid that dreaded “downward spiral” because they are banking on this group being “young and healthy” :=0
Prime causes of Gen Y being young but NOT healthy … that is, exhibiting heart disease, stroke and other ailments before their time?
*33% obesity rate
*Lack of exercise
*Smoking
Is anyone surprised??
Us boomers didn’t have 14 kinds of hot Cheetos and Taquis to choose from when we were growing up, and, in any case, we had to eat standard cafeteria fare in schools. That is, a meat or fish, a starch, a vegetable or salad and dessert. All were SMALL portions that fit into indentations on a square plastic tray which we bussed ourselves. It came with WHITE milk … NOT chocolate milk.
Cost per day was .25 in elementary school, .35 in Jr High and .50 in Sr High. If five paper lunch tix were purchased at a time, a different color ticket was issued to “free-lunch kids” who had to stand in a separate line to get their food.
No carbonated beverages were available in machines at any public school (against the law).
PE was a REQUIRED class for Grades 1-12 (all 3 years of Sr. High PE required to graduate). It included rope climbing to a 14 ft ceiling, obstacle courses, track and field and individual and team sports. If the weather was too cold, class was held in the the gym. For grades 7-12, a student had to dress out for PE, participate in the activity and shower afterwards. No excuses.
Of course, we didn’t have any cell phones, computers or other gadgets to spend time sitting around playing with, either.
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Fast forward to today’s CA public school curriculum where PE is an elective and Carl’s Jr, Taco Bell, Chipotle, Starbucks and a yogurt bar are all <3 mins walk away (seniors have open-campus privileges).
A typical grade 1-12 public school lunch is now Dominos Pizza and chocolate milk.
Thus, Gen Y has the health problems we're seeing today and into the near future.
Among those signing up on state exchanges, I think a portion of Gen Y might be better served to sign up for a more "comprehensive plan" than the "catastrophic plans" that are being pushed on them or they are going to find themselves asked to pay out-of-pocket for a LOT of procedures .... with money they likely don't have.
Case in point: Cost of echocardiogram procedure in various markets:
