So it’s been a week since I’ve been termed and the week went fast, so fast that I just realized I need to do something about health insurance. I received notice that if I want to continue my health insurance plan on COBRA, I can kindly cough up $1,400 per month for the privelage of being “insured” against some potential health problems.

So what does $1,400 mean to me? Well, that is more money than my mortgage even when I hadn’t paid any of it down. The monthly payment on a $240,000 home financed at 6% for 30 years would be $1,438. Would you rather have a home or have health insurance.

This would be the equivalent of THREE new car payments of $466.67.

If I took $1,400 a month and invested it at 6% for 30 years, I would have $1.4 million at the end of 30 years.

We’ll likely go on my wife’s insurance plan but it doesn’t escape me that we may suddenly become part of the millions of uninsured people out there if she loses her job. I wonder what would happen if corporations stood up to the health insurance industry and simply said, “we’re not paying these insurance premiums anymore!”

I would imagine most health insurance companies would immediately go bankrupt. I would imagine that health care costs would deflate rapidly as well. Those $12 bottle of aspirin would suddenly compete with $0.99 Walgreens generic brand.

Someone needs to do something, we need change. If only we had leadership that could change this mess.