[fabsroman]

Val,

I thought of one more thing. You started another thread here regarding new vehicles that you are interested in. Some of them were pretty pricey and on the luxury side. If you are thinking about buying a luxury car and you are complaining about an increase in your health insurance, I have absolutely no sympathy for you. Just as I have no sympathy for several of my clients.

When my clients start up a business, I tell them to pay themselves the bare minimum they need to survive. Well, I have one lady paying herself the equivalent of $125,000 a year to "survive." How anybody needs $125,000 a year to survive is beyond me. However, she did trade her 2 year old Lexus RX 330 in on a brand new Lexus RX 330 because the old one was getting dirty and it did not have navigation. Mind you, it didn't cost her anything because they gave her what she owed on it as a trade in and she only had to pay an additional $12,000 to get into the new one, and she has the same car payment for the next 6 years. She has come to the conclusion that she "needs" a new car every two years because she cannot stand them when they are dirty. Now, those were all her words. Of course, she just got married at the justice of the peace because she could not afford the wedding that she wanted, and she is complaining that the company's operating account is continually decreasing. Wonder why? Because she is paying herself $125,000 a year to live.

I could go on and on. My granite client went out and bought a pretty large house and several vehicles because he thought the money would always be coming in. Now it isn't and he couldn't even pay his taxes come April 18th this year.

If you want health insurance, buy a cheaper car that will get you to and from where you have to go. There are several that are in the $10,000 to $20,000 range that will work just fine. My Taurus cost $17,000 eight years ago and it has lasted those 8 years and 146,000 miles. My wife's Sonata cost $18,000 4 years ago and it is at 90,000.

At the end of the day, I kind of agree with the high deductible and high copay health insurance policies because it prevents people from running to the doctor for every little thing. I have been to several health insurance seminars and you wouldn't believe the things that the insurance companies and doctors do. For instance, if you are on a health insurance plan that uses capitation (i.e., the plan pays the doctor a fixed amount per year per patient no matter how many times the patient visits), then the doctor's secretary is conditioned to schedule you a week or two down the road to see if the symptoms resolve on their own (i.e., the doctor is getting paid regardless of whether or not he sees you). Now, if your insurance plan pays the doctor for every visit, the secretary will schedule you right away so that the doctor can make that money, even if the cold or whatever would resolve itself over time. Now, you will probably blame the attorneys for this somehow, but here are the doctors milking the system and treating patients like crap. Why does one patient get preferential scheduling over another based upon the insurance policy they have?

There is plenty wrong with what we have going on in this country, but I think it has to do with people's morals in general. If people stopped lying and cheating, and they started saving money instead of spending everything they make, and they needed less, then things might go a little smoother and there might be less complaining. However, manufacturers and marketing departments create so many things and create so many wants, that it is insane. Nobody can have everything that is made, yet we want it all. Even though we have a CD player in our car that works perfectly fine and a computer that can burn CD's so we could essentially have all our music in the car, we want a $300 MP3 player because it is trendy, a little less bulky than those CD's, and better organized than the CD's. With that said, my wife has one and I just got a new PDA that functions as an MP3 player. Needed the PDA for work, didn't need the MP3 player part of it, but I'll take it.

Why am I so down on society in general, probably because I see the financial condition of my clients and very few are saving any money. Probably because I run into potential clients that want me to lie for them. Somehow, I think it has a lot to do with my profession and the elements that I am exposed to.

Okay, now I really have to get back to work.