Educators Health Insurance Issues If there is a group which has been taken advantage of in the world of health insurance, it is the educator. I say this from the standpoint of a retired educator after 28 years in the business.

Why?
Educators are universally taken advantage of because of the group insurance practice of charging a very reasonable premium for the employee (teacher) and usurious rates for the spouse. Take my case as an example. My wife is provided very good coverage with a major carrier for less than $100 per month. That’s a great deal! 

However, that same carrier wants to charge me $480 per month for the same coverage. As if that wasn’t bad enough, that’s a fixed rate for the spouse of an employee. Think about it…how many spouses of female elementary teachers are young, bulletproof 30 year old men who are perfectly healthy? That guy can obtain like-or-better coverage for about $200 per month.

Here’s the real shame: Teachers sign up for this deal all the time! In this scenario, those two 30 year olds will pay $600 per month for health insurance and not really pay any attention to the cost breakdown of the premium. Why not take out an individual major medical for the spouse who is self employed, stays at home or does not have benefits at his job? $300 per month is a lot of savings per month and many families with one teacher can realize this kind of savings. Because of my background, many of our clients are teaching families. Let a Longhorn consultant evaluate your situation and see if there might be these kind of savings in your future.

Life Insurance
Educators often take the life insurance offered to them by the district. The rates are good and there is no underwriting. All they have to do is sign up. There is risk in taking life insurance this way, especially if all their life insurance coverage is through a group policy. If one never leaves the district in which he works or never has a chance of changing careers, then maybe that’s not a bad deal. However, imagine a scenario in which the teacher decides to change careers or is laid off or changes districts for one who does not offer life insurance at all. Any of these could happen to any teacher. This kind of coverage is not portable and will be dropped once you leave the district. What if you have been diagnosed with diabetes at some point? Cancer? Or let’s say you are 50 years old when the layoff comes? You do not want to shop for life insurance at 50 years old unless you absolutely have to. Longhorn will show you how to take out very inexpensive portable level premium term coverage that you will own and can take with you position to position.