It's my pleasure to welcome you to the Clark Howard Show, where our mission is to serve

you and empower you to make better financial decisions in your life.

So open enrollment season for healthcare is upon us and I want to help you with some

of the options you've got to work your way through.

I'm also going to address how to buy a car the right way now that the market has actually

started slowing down.

So open enrollment has different meanings, different aspects.

There are those of us who work for a mid-size or larger employer where we're given a kit

each year where we pick what health plan we're going to go into, what other benefits we

might buy and the employer may or may not offer some allocation of money where they subsidize

the various premiums.

They offer maybe short-term disability, long-term disability, life insurance, dental insurance,

and maybe a few other stray things that are offered and you pick and choose and end

up with them out that's deducted from your pay each month.

Even there are people having to buy coverage for themselves which is actually a very small

part of the insurance market.

What you buy on the federal state exchanges that the umbrella is healthcare.gov and then

if your state has its own exchange it will take you directly to the state thing to pick

what's known as a compliant plan that's one that has required federal coverages that

are color coded.

Bronze, silver, gold, there's virtually no platinum plans anymore.

But you pick and that determines what deductibles you'll have and what out of pocket you'll have

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