From: "Keith F. Lynch" <kfl at KeithLynch.net>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Tackling Concerns of Independent Workers
Date: Mon, 25 Mar 2013 21:40:04 -0400 (EDT)
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>

How does the the Freelancers Union differ from the National
Association for the Self-Employed?  I had medical insurance through
the latter about 15 years ago.  When they raised their rates by over
20%, despite my never having filed a claim, I canceled, and I haven't
had medical insurance since.

It was just not worth spending a decade's income for an additional
month's life expectancy.  Since that's about what a lifetime of medical
insurance cost in those days, and that's about what it bought you.

The cost of insurance has gone way up since then, and if current
trends continue, within a decade its median cost will exceed the
median salary.  Its *value* has gone up by much less, if at all.
US life expectancies are actually dropping.

Since you don't want people bitching onlist, I'll keep my opinion
of a "solution" to this serious problem that consists of making it
illegal to not have insurance to myself.  I just hope nobody tells
the president that in the Soviet Union they "solved" unemployment by
making it a crime, and sentencing the jobless to work in the salt
mines.  It might give him ideas.