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Taking a job that offers no health insurance

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KelliM

New member
Hello,

I just took a job with a company (small) that offers no health benefits because it's a mechanical contractor and those guys are in the union and get insurance through there. Since they don't offer health insurance, they are compensating me at 60,000 per year. Do you think this is good when I have to pay for health insurance?
 


Just Blue

Senior Member
Hello,

I just took a job with a company (small) that offers no health benefits because it's a mechanical contractor and those guys are in the union and get insurance through there. Since they don't offer health insurance, they are compensating me at 60,000 per year. Do you think this is good when I have to pay for health insurance?
What state?...and if this IS in the US, yours is not a legal question.
 

Taxing Matters

Overtaxed Member
Hello,

I just took a job with a company (small) that offers no health benefits because it's a mechanical contractor and those guys are in the union and get insurance through there. Since they don't offer health insurance, they are compensating me at 60,000 per year. Do you think this is good when I have to pay for health insurance?
Whether the job is a good one and whether the pay is at least adequate depends on a lot of factors, some of which are strictly personal to you. As a financial matter, the issue is whether the pay you are getting fully covers the difference of what you'd get with a job some other place that pays all the cost of your health insurance (which pretty rare) or covers at least some good part of it.

So you start with the fact that you are getting $60,000 a year without health insurance. What would you get paid at some other company with full health insurance for doing the exact same job? And what would it cost you to get similar insurance on your own? If you'd get paid $52,000 at a job with full insurance but it would cost you $10,000 to buy a similar policy on your own then at the job where you get insurance paid by the employer is clearly better since you end up with $2,000 more cash in your pocket at the end of the year and still have essentially the same health insurance, especially when you consider the tax savings that go along with the job that has the health plan paid for by the employer. What the employer pays for that health plan is not taxable to you, whereas the extra cash paid to you in your present job is taxable income.

Of course, maybe that employer sponsored health plan would be a lot more than you need, and you'd be happy with a less expensive plan that, say, costs only $5,000/year. In that case you'd be getting the health insurance you want and still end up with $55,000 in salary to spend how you want, but with the employer paid plan in the example above you get a health plan that is more than you need and only $52,000 salary to spend how you want (ignoring taxes of course). In that case the job with the employer provided insurance may not be financially the best outcome.

Then there are the intangibles of the job. Do you like the job and the people you work with? What kind of future might you have there? Are the hours what you want, and are your bosses flexible when you need time off or need to adjust your schedule? Is the job close to home to save you lots of commuting time? And those are just a few of the things that go into job satisfaction. It's not all about the money.

So do the financial comparison and consider everything else about the job and decide what you think about it. It's a very individual thing, so no one here (or even your friends and family) really can't tell you whether this the job you should have. That's up to you.
 

KelliM

New member
Thanks for answering me even though this really isn't a legal question. My current job with insurance pays me 45,000 a year and it takes me an hour to get here every day. I don't have a bachelors degree, even though I am working on it, so this new job, I've never even come close to making this kind of money, plus it's 20 minutes from my house. My insurance will be costing me 617 a month with a 3500 deductible, so I guess I really made a good decision to leave my current job for the new job making alot more money.
 

KelliM

New member
I think you did as well but the time to have been doing all of this thinking was before you quit the old job and took the new one.
My current job was trying to match the offer which is why I was over thinking the situation, but they couldnt.
 

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