Should my wife and I join the same health insurance plan or each of our employer’s plans?
Hello! My wife and I are in our 20’s and both starting full time jobs in January. We are trying to decide if it would be more cost effective to each join our own employer’s health insurance plans, or to both join one of our employers plans. (We want to choose HDHP so we can open HSA’s). My company pays for most of the cost of health insurance. Health insurance at my wife’s company is 100% paid for by the company and covers the whole family. We thought it would be a no-brainer to both join her company’s insurance plan since we would get both health care for free. BUT – it turns out my company contributes to HSA plans, and it looks like my company’s HSA contributions outweigh the cost of health insurance premiums. So we would actually make money if I choose my employers health plan, and make even more money if we both join it. This sounds too good to be true. Is it unheard of for employers to contribute more to your HSA than they deduct from your paycheck for health care? Are we oversimplifying this decision and ignoring other important variables?
Screenshot of the details of my health insurance plan (how much I pay vs company pays):
Screenshot of the details of my company’s HSA contributions:
Screenshot of my calculations:
Also, is there a chance that my wife would not be able to open an HSA if we joins my plan? We don’t know how to open up HSA’s and don’t know if that needs to be done through your employer or not.
Thank you so much in advance.
