Health insurance in the U.S.  It is something else.  We've been spoiled for the last 7 years or so.  We worked for the  U.S. Government while in the Marshall Islands and had a great health care plan.  When we worked for a large corporation in the U.S., the prices were attractive as well and when we were in the Middle East, the plan was superb.  We just returned to the U.S. and my wife is working for a small, woman owned business in Texas.  The insurance options are not that appealing.  Here are the choices - about $98/month for her, but around $580/mo for the two of us.  There is also a $5,000 deductible, and you are pay 20% after you hit the deductible.   Wow.

     My mom just had her aortic valve replaced and she is doing great.  She is on Medicare and has a supplemental plan as well.  A friend of ours who is a doctor came in while she was still in intensive care and she casually asked how much the surgery would have cost if she did not have the insurance she had.  He said, "In between 450 to - 500K."   Know what the approximate cost is to have your aortic valve replaced at a top notch facility in India that does nothing but replace aortic valves?  Between 6 and 9K.  Throw in another 2K for the plane ticket.  So let's just say I need to get my aortic valve replaced (and I don't).  With the insurance offered and if it were done in the U.S., I first would have to shell out 5K for the deductible.  Then I'd have to pay 20% of the balance.  Take the low end of 450K, that's an additional 90K I'd have to pay out of pocket.  95K vs. 11K at the high end overseas.  Medical retirement is looking better and better when you look at the numbers.  Just saying.