"Dave Says..." on Job Lost

Of Course! Dave always has SOMETHING to say! I can't add anything more, but I thought it was worth passing along...

What To Do If You've Lost Your Job

We ourselves are trying to hedge a bit, though our debt is gone but the house. We do have an baby HSA (Health Savings Account - Thank you President Bush!!) started, but that was a net change, really, due to our huge premium being reduced. Our hope is that we will be able to build both the HSA and the emergency fund, but making the dollars stretch to both is a challenge.

So, one option might be to hold the money (except for immediate medical expenses) until we get through the tough going at least and build the emergency fund. We could make only one or two deposits per year on the HSA - unlike the old $9,960 annual premium that we had before. I don't however want to underfund the HSA...

For those of us who are learning the whole HSA thing, the idea is to build that thing up to something obscene saved in the HSA account (Maybe $20-$30K over the next two-three years), and have a high-deductible, low premium catastrophic plan. The money that you put in the HSA is not taxed and you get to use it on everything from Dr.'s visits to Prescriptions to Aspirin.

(You just about have to put the whole family on it to keep things straight, so I had to file some stuff to exempt me out of my work policy.)

So, we have some options I think... Before we had very few options and that became very apparent when the Health Insurance premium alone exceeded the mortgage payment! I kept thinking, "We could go buy another house with this money!"

Those of you who get health insurance as a work benefit had better enjoy it while it lasts. I have heard some things coming to an employer near you via the Stimulus Plan that are really drastic to maybe all businesses. I haven't been able to confirm this, so I am refraining to detail about it yet; but isn't it deplorable to anyone else that we "just don't know" what our legislators even voted on?!!

Those of you who want to mess with our HSA and impose some Federal Health Care Plan are risking my wrath! :) The Gov't cannot produce it - they can only take it away from my neighbors (not me yet - I don't make enough $) and hand it to someone else - after some legal mumbo-jumbo and a red tape marathon. As my wife says, "...they did such a good job with Medicare and Medicaid, why would we think we should give them the whole system?"

I love my wife... Now she's even beating me to the good lines...

I didn't mean to get into this here, but it was something that I intended to mention sometime anyway... My trust is not in legal extortion (insurance), nor is it in miracles of science (Health Care), nor is it in scared politicians; it is instead fully and completely invested in the Creator who loves and provides for me.

I don't have to think for a second that He will forget us. I don't have to be upset if the Gov't forgets the Constitution and "In God we Trust" because God is my hope and my salvation for this life and the one yet to come. NO MATTER WHAT!