Health Insurance Costs

The one time I was on COBRA, under 3 years ago, I paid close to $700/month, and I was the only person included in my coverage. Health insurance premiums have very likely gone up since then, and family sizes above 1 (such as even I have now) would cost meaningfully more than that. Smaller companies than that employer might also have higher total premium cost per employee, if they aim for good coverage.

Most employers (tech) pay 90%+ of healthcare costs. Worst case scenario you might be responsible for $6k per person per year if you heavily used the healthcare system.Why would you need to earn 3x as much?

Most tech companies offer great insurance on top of higher salaries, so this doesn't really effect highly paid employees. For example, my insurance premium is around $200/month for my family and I have a maximum out of pocket cost of $3k a year.So the system works well for me at least, but I know it is much much worse for others

I spent 6 months on a private health insurance plan 4 years ago. It was about $200 per month with a very high deductible.This is in a state that is favorable for ACA. I just hopped on the state website now and I can get a similar plan with a premium of $250 per month. There are a lot of options with better deductibles and higher premiums.It's a burden for those who want to go without external employment, but I found it reasonable. It's less than my monthly budget for food.

Total cost on the open market for that kind of plan is 1k - 1.2k, so your work basically has no health benefit? I have never had that experience...

My family cost 1000/month for each person and we have a 10k cross family out of pocket max. Have a kid or two means more than 50k a year. Only some can afford this if you're paying it for yourself. We chose to go cobra instead of ACA last year. If I wasn't in the software engineer world I wouldn't be able to continue.

Paying 25K a year in health insurance premiums instead of 2.5K is not a realistic choice for most people. That employer subsidy is a massive difference.

Depends on your age and dependents, but in the US the cost of health insurance can easily be in the same price range as housing. Employees are often not aware of the actual cost since most or all of the premiums are often paid by the employer.

Don't quote me, but something like $1000/month for employee +1 coverage. Of that, ~30% comes out of my paycheck and is tax deductible. Not to put too fine a point on it: $300/mo pretax is a steal. Even assuming the full cost would, IMHO, be reasonable. $12,000 sounds like a lot but I suspect that BCBS is doing more for me in real terms right now than the Federal government to which I hand over the equivalent of a mid-range Mercedes in income tax every year.

Generally your employer provides you a fixed set of say 1 - 3 options, each better but more expensive than the prior. Our insurance policies generally also include a deductible, an amount you have to pay out of pocket before coverage kicks in. For example $3,000 per year. The higher the monthly premium, the lower the deductible. The employer pays ~50% - 70% of the premium and the employee pays the rest with pre tax money. The cost increases as you add children and spouse to your policy. Spouse i