V, I did check out the statement and it is correct. It has been confirmed to me by both an insurance broker and several employees of the health insurer. My shock on this one is that I don't think 99% of the American public has any idea about this little gimmick. The cost of $900 per month is a huge price to pay for insurance that, quite frankly, isn't that great. I see the CEO's of the major insurance companies here getting seven and even eight digit salaries and now I can see how that can happen. There is tremendous competition for people to sign up for what is touted as "free" insurance. I wonder what the reaction would be if most Americans could see how "free" this insurance is.
So, he has to pay a premium on medicare coverage that would otherwise be free to him, because he's not yet applied to collect Social Security benefits, right? Then, he's offered free insurance- type and necessity to him unclear from your post- which he takes just because it's free, only to discover later that it wasn't free, after all, and that he's getting the benefit some kind of premium relief paid for by the government, which he nevertheless accepts. It's not the government that has done wrong in this case, it seems to me, but possibly the client, and the insurance company. Unless the client is a person of modest means, needs the coverage, and the coverage was designed to cover medical expenses that his medicare benefits would not reach, this doesn't compute, to my mind.
The Medicare premium has to be paid by all who collect it regardless of whether they have started to collect social security. Signing up for medicare at 65 is MANDATORY. If you do not sign up at 65 you will be penalized later and charged higher premiums. The "free" portion of the insurance is meant to cover part of what Medicare does not cover. It does not cover all of what Medicare does not cover, only part of it. The additional insurance is advertised widely as being free. It is free to the consumer themselves with the taxpayer footing the bill. Everyone whom I know that is on Medicare also signs up for the additional insurance. After all, it's "free." My point with this V is that the insurance is not "free" and that most Americans have no idea that they are being ripped off again in the name of entitlements that provide very littel benefit for the individual but enrich an already bloated industry.
