I'm sure some people have wrestled with this question- where to work. Judging from the fact that jobs are scarce and good health insurance is hard to find, I might not find the answer I'm looking for. Luckily it seems that people here work together and I'll be happy to take any advice that's given!
I should start out by saying that I live, and plan on working, in Massachusetts.
I've been working for a year and a half at a retail outlet, and I've found that the health insurance offered is "less than adequate". I won't get into the nitty-gritty, but I've had to cancel appointments because of out of pocket costs.
Post your suggestions. Love to see the comments. Let me know if you know of any companies that offer great insurance tailored to type 1 diabetics too!
My impression has been that government jobs have very good insurance. Not sure if that applies on State level anymore given budget cuts but a Federal gov't job might get you insanely good coverage like what our congresspeople get.
My family has coverage through state government BC/BS and our coverage is excellent. I would also suggest that our experience has been that companies that are large, nationwide type companies have had better insurance coverage than smaller companies just based on a greater number of employees I guess. It also seems like some retail organizations now are going more towards part time workers with no benefits.
Congress gets something completely different than what the civil servants get. Although there are multiple insurance options for federal employees, they aren't the super-charged plans that Congress seems to have mandated for themselves.
Just pick a large company like one of the telecommunication company's. None of the insurance company's have plans that are tailored for someone with a chronic illness like diabetes. Most company's would rather not hire someone with type 1 diabetes and their insurance company would never give you coverage if they could keep from it. You are not required to disclose health information for most jobs..but there are some exceptions.
A large company does offer the best coverage generally and also you want to take into consideration as an adult if the products offered have a pre existing condition waiting period. Generally smaller companies with small number of employees there plans require pre existing condition clauses. Larger companies and or HMO's might not.
I'll point out that I work for a rather large and rapidly growing retail company. Regardless of their profits, they offer an inexpensive plan, but at a high cost of higher out of pocket fees since not everything is covered. They are, however, subject to Massachusetts state laws, so as far as insurance companies not giving coverage- non-issue.
I recommend this too - for many visa reasons I can not really get a good deal for insurance, but it is another big hurdle in the chronic life of a diabetic. Being diabetic is a lifelong expense - unless we change that by demanding a cure. I'm pretty everyone here doesn't want to be made a bank for these insurance companies for life...
Federal government. You get a wide selection of plans and most of them are fantastic. I have the federal BCBS and have never had an issue getting things paid for (pump, CGM, etc). I also happen to really like my job, so the benefits are just a really nice bonus. I still have out of pocket costs, but they are predictable and easy to manage.
The worst insurance I ever had was while working for a non-profit. It was a PPO and I ended up paying significant amounts out of pocket. For healthy folks this wasn't a big deal, but for me it meant that I either had to fork over most of my wages to health care costs OR forego some things that I needed (i.e., endo appointments, tests, etc). I am thankfully no longer in that position, and it's a wonderful feeling!
