Believe it or not, I’ve always said I wanted the option of a health savings account tied to a high deductible health care plan. Fortunately, my family has spent little on health care in recent years with the exception of delivering a couple of babies.

I’ve thought in the years where there weren’t new family additions, that we would actually save money with a high deductible plan (hdhp) with lower premiums tied to a health savings plan, which allows you to put money away pre-tax for health care costs. Many employers even contribute money to the account for you.

But a story I read in the Washington Post years ago featuring Felix Meschke, a father and University of Minnesota business professor who has patiently explained stock market statistics to me on more than one occasion, makes me worry that an HSA would actually end up costing us a lot of money.

Here’s the hitch: a hdhp has a deductible of at least a couple grand that you have to pay and then you have a per-person out of pocket maximum of a couple grand beyond that. So these plans are really only good for people with very low or very high medical costs.

Well, this year, I finally have this option. And I’m wondering if any of you have stories about whether such plans have worked well for you or cost you lots of money?

Either way, I have to say that the health system has become so complicated that you practically need a math degree or a crystal ball during open enrollment.

Other links to read on HSAs:

The U.S. Treasury’s cheat sheet about how these plans work.

Here’s a blog post from Free Money Finance on how the HSA can act as a retirement account.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 7th, 2008 at 4:25 pm and is filed under Uncategorized, family finance. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.