I promise that I will get back to the PPACA. Probably tonight, because I wanted to be done by June, and at this rate, that will be June of 2015. First, though, I wanted to address briefly the issue of the worth of women.
Now, this is a relevant issue right now in a lot of arenas. Without getting too political, there are those right now saying that women’s health care shouldn’t be paid for in the same way as a man’s would be. Additionally, there are only 11 states that ban the practice of charging women higher insurance rates than men (known as gender rating – which the PPACA would ban nationally – we’ll get to that in a later section). This pricing discrimination makes sense from a purely financial standpoint – in part because women physically have babies while men don’t. Women also tend to go to the doctor more when they are younger. And because our model of health care is based on insurance, this means that women are more expensive in their younger years, when they are getting insurance through private companies and not through government funded Medicare.
So what does this have to do with me? Well, I just graduated with my Master’s in Public Health. My graduation ceremony is in June. My older son lives out of state with his dad during the school year, so I would need to fly him up special to go. And I was having difficulties booking the flight. Because I didn’t feel as though this accomplishment was worth the money for the airfare. Even though the cost was a fraction of the total cost of the degree, and even though I would like nothing more than to have both of my sons there when I walk.
How can I expect other people to value me and other women equally when I don’t myself?
stayathomeeconomist 