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Finding Affordable Health Insurance For The Self Employed |
If you are fortunate enough to be self employed it can be extremely difficult to find affordable health insurance ?research indicates that many people don’t go self employed for this very reason. Generally speaking, if you are employed by a large company, you have more options for affordable health insurance through your company’s group plan.
If you are self employed and married, one easy option is to take out health insurance through your spouse. You may pay a little bit more to add yourself on to their insurance and you may also have to wait to do this until benefits enrollment is offered, usually in the fall for the following year. This is usually the cheapest option for insuring not only yourself, but your children as well.
One thing you should consider if it’s relevant to your situation is taking advantage of what is commonly known as COBRA (Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act) health coverage. By law, if you leave your job, you are entitled to continuing health coverage provided by your employer for a certain amount of time.
COBRA coverage can be invaluable in bridging the gap between the health insurance provided by your old company and the insurance you take out for yourself when starting up a new business.
The type of insurance you need will vary as to your situation. If you employ between 2 and 50 people you would probably save money by enrolling in a group health insurance plan. If your business is just literally yourself, you may want to take out a temporary policy. These can be changed easily if your situation changes and are relatively inexpensive.
Finally, if you self employed and are in a financial position to do it ?pay your premiums annually, rather than spreading the payments out over a year and paying every month. This may save you a significant amount of money.
And one piece of good news is that health insurance costs for the self employed have been tax-deductible for the last few years - a trend only likely to improve.
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