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By David on October 30th, 2009
Money Quote Friday – Contentment Edition.
Money can’t buy happiness, that’s for sure. Have a great weekend everyone…
By David on October 29th, 2009
The Best Places For Green Tech Jobs.
Considering ditching your current employer and looking for better pastures in the field of green tech? Now might be a good time to do so, according to CNN/Money. A recent article from them lists the best cities poised to do the best in clean, green tech, so if you live near one (or don’t mind moving) these would be the places to start looking for that new career. Here is the Top 5 from the list:
1. San Francisco — Oakland — San Jose, CA
2. Los Angeles — Riverside — Orange County, CA
3. New York — Northern New Jersey — Long Island, NY, NJ, CT, PA
4. Boston — Worcester — Lawrence — Lowell — Brockton, MA, NH
5. Washington — Baltimore, DC, MD, VA, WV
Click through to see the rest of the cities and to read more about the green job boom.
By David on October 28th, 2009
Comparing Prescription Prices To Save Myself A Ton Of Money.
Within a few weeks, I will be without insurance for the first time in my adult. Why? Well, a few reasons. The biggest reason, and the one I have not mentioned here yet, is that my wife and I are divorcing and I have been on her group insurance plan. She has amazing insurance (one advantage to being a teacher, I suppose) that I will no longer have access to as soon as the divorce is final, unfortunately. And to continue with COBRA under her plan, it would cost me over $500 a month – an expense I cannot incur at this time. The second reason, and why I cannot get insurance on my own, is actually two-fold:
1. I am self-employed, so I need to buy private insurance
2. I cannot get private insurance because I had cancer last year
So, I will be without health insurance until this country joins the rest of the civilized world in offering a government-sponsored health plan for people like myself, I get a job at Starbucks, or I get married to someone in a group plan. Fantastic! Anyway, that’s not my main point of writing this post and I will cover this more in-depth in a future one. For now, I just wanted to talk about buying prescriptions when you don’t have insurance. Did you know that the “no insurance” price for medication varies by quite a bit depending on where you buy it? Even if a Target and a Walmart are right next door to each other, their prices can vary. And since I am on a medication that I take every morning (and need to continue taking), I had to start shopping for the cheapest place to buy my medicine from. I was honestly surprised by what I found out, and I imagine there are a ton of people paying way more than they need to for their daily meds. Some pharmacies discount for supplies longer than 30 days, but some don’t, so I am basing this on a per-month basis.
- Local pharmacy here in Taos – $17.50 per month
- Target in Denver – $28.99 per month
- Walmart in Denver – $23.00 per month (although even if they were free, I wouldn’t get them here)
- Costco – $12.56 per month (90 day only $23!)
- Walgreens in Denver – $29.99 per month
The clear winner? Costco, by a long shot. They are $5 less per month than the next cheapest, my current pharmacy for the 9 days I have left in New Mexico. And if I get 90 days at a time from Costco, the price drops to $7.66 per month, which is crazy amount of savings over the regular pharmacies. The best part? You don’t need to be a member of Costco to use their pharmacy! Since I will be a single guy once again, I don’t have much need for bulk amounts of milk from the store, so it’s good that I don’t need a membership to get my discounted drugs.
So for those of you who might not have insurance (or not very good insurance, at least) might want to call up all the local pharmacies in your area and ask them how much your meds cost. I am so glad I did, as it looks like it is going to save me quite a bit of money each and every month. Now if Costco could just offer me health insurance, I would be all set…
Photo from Shutterstock
