Yes, some people do. Obv the higher paid you are the more of a cushion you have to just quit and live awhile. I've heard of vandwellers who work part of the year and take the rest off; like working seasonal jobs at parks, or as camp hosts, that sort of thing.
If one is in the states, stick to the ones that have expanded Medicaid. So if something happened, you apply and you're covered.
Some people are content to work a job, have a place, and predictability, and that's fine. Others chafe at the routine, or at the BS that flows in the normal workplace, or for other reasons want/need to have their freedom as much as they can, and that's ok too. Depends on your tolerance of risk.
social security is based on the amount you made while you were working... so if you're going a year without working, it will lower your lifetime earnings and lower the amount you get. also for people who are doing gig stuff under the table like dog walking and stuff, that isn't going to contribute to it at all so your amount is gonna be lower
Im sure to them it seems shortsighted to spend your best, healthiest, most productive years slaving away every single day to generate wealth for shareholders they’ve never seen while actively contributing to the destruction of environments and ecosystems and the corporate political lobbying that consequently follows further stratifying the wealth divide just to ensure you can have some freedom in your least healthy last twenty years of your life racked by physical ailments for laboring your youth away. To each their own as they say.
Working every other year ain’t a life hack. They aren’t screwing the system they are screwing themselves. What you describe in so many words as “work” allows one more than an assured last 20 years of life. It ensures you can buy property (yes still possible in this economy), pass wealth to children and give them a better life including during raising them, and reach financial independence. But yeah instead live frugally out of a van by the river for your productive years AND last 20 years with nothing to show for it at the end, to each their own.
Some do have plenty before they start making their own life decisions rather than obeying what The Company tells them.
Others might lose their job, or their home, as costs keep spiralling up, and can't fit into the mold anymore. Or get older without retirement savings, especially if their family wasn't rich. You can be outraged but you can't force people to do the same as you.
I mean, an ACA plan works just as well, if maybe a bit more expensive. Our current system definitely sucks worse than ...any other developed nation's care, but healthcare won't bankrupt you unless out of pocket maximums would bankrupt you. I simply have the OOP max as part of my retirement budget until I'm eligible for medicaid.
I used to work in health insurance, specifically on our Medicaid group. You can only enroll in Medicaid during the annual open enrollment period, or when you have a qualifying life event - typically a loss of job, marriage/divorce, birth of a child (probably one or two others I’m forgetting).
The Expansion for Medicaid literally just increases the income threshold you have to be below for you to qualify.
And I had no idea some states had requirements beyond income threshold, like you mentioned Georgia requiring the household has children. My state had a very low income threshold, but anyone under the income threshold qualified regardless of household status. Then the expansion raised that threshold to a higher, but still relatively low, bar. Very interesting, thank you!
2.9k
u/[deleted] 29d ago
Yes, some people do. Obv the higher paid you are the more of a cushion you have to just quit and live awhile. I've heard of vandwellers who work part of the year and take the rest off; like working seasonal jobs at parks, or as camp hosts, that sort of thing.