My wife and I have good health insurance available to us through work, and we get it cheap. We both work at a large state university, so we pay $15 each per month as part of a spouse plan to get insurance for our family (us + 1 kid). This is a standard HMO -- no deductible, $20 co-pay for regular visits, $40 for specialists (no need for referrals), free annual physical / healthy kid stuff, etc. When we had our daughter, I think we paid $250 for the whole thing, including all the pre-natal visits.
To round out the picture, we also both have access to 403b and 457. Right now, we max both TIRAs, 403bs and my 457. My wife is going on unpaid leave next year, so that will change. I'm hoping to keep maxing out my 457, with something left over for TIRA (and maybe 403b). When she comes back, I'll switch it to max out both 457s, TIRAs and do the rest in our 403bs. This past year, we finally got some decent 457 options.
Because of that, we've never looked at HSAs. Open enrollment is coming up, though, so theoretically we could switch to a HDHP (both HMO and PPO are available) and start an HSA. I'm right that this would be a dumb thing to do, though, right? In other words, we're better off keeping the no deductible insurance, even though it makes us ineligible for HSA.
Thanks for your input. This feels like a really dumb question, but I see so many posts raving about HSAs that I figured I'd ask.
EDIT: I just looked at the site, and it looks like the state contributes "up to" $1000 for a family HSA -- can't find what determines the "up to" factor.
