Taste the Healthcare

This happens all the time to my wife and me. Our friends will go to this brand new chain restaurant and then come back just raving about how good it is. They're like - "Oh, you gotta try Buca di Beppo. It's so authentic. You eat your food 'family style'."

And then we have to go with them to Buca di Beppo and just as I expected the food tastes like a monkey crapped on spaghetti and then covered it with tomato sauce. Okay, Buca isn't that bad, but just because they call the cheese - "formaggio" does not mean it came from Italy. More likely it was canned in Pittsburgh.

Not that I don't eat at McDonald's from time to time. I'm just saying there's good food and there's crap food and part of living as a human being in knowing the difference.

Why am I telling you this? Because, it's the same with movies, art, music, books - does not matter a bit. People cannot tell shit from Shinola. Unfortunately, this law is so very true for insurance and healthcare.

A few years ago I worked for a large manufacturer. One year, the company decided to let the employees choose what kind of healthcare insurance they wanted. I thought this was a great idea. The company offered several options from "good luck you're on your own" to "Don't worry everything's covered" The company shared a percentage of the costs, so it would have to pay more for the more expensive plan.

The whole company voted and guess which option they took? Yep, you guessed it. They choose the cheapest and crappiest. Sure enough - we met the enemy and he was us. The HR rep said that most people wanted to save the extra $50 a month.