Soon-to-Be Retirees: Crack Open Your Wallets for Healthcare

I don't know what scares me more.  Getting old, or knowing I'm not going to be able to pay for it.

A study just out says that retired couples should plan on spending $220,000 for medical expenses.  The really scary part is that the story applauds this, because that's down 8% from last year.

While we're not that close to retirement, we're still starting to think about it.

According to the AP, the study assumes a woman will live to 85 and a man to 82.  Fidelity, which did the study, attributes this drop to the slowdown in healthcare costs because of the economy (people are spending less on healthcare, or avoiding it altogether).

We recently switched our health insurance -- maybe I should say my health insurance (my 62-year-old husband has none) -- to a high-deductible policy.  True, we have coverage should anything drastic happen (like the cancer I experienced in 2005 and 2007), but we're paying a hefty insurance policy every month, and paying all our medical bills ourselves, on top of it all.

So it's like we're paying the insurance company to go to the doctor.  Pretty dumb.  But for those with pre-existing conditions and a certain age on their sides, you don't have much recourse.

So I guess no more dinners out or dry-cleaning or trips to Lord & Taylor.  But maybe we can still have steak once a month, or is that pushing it?




























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