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Speaker 1: So should your employer give you health insurance? We've got

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Speaker 1: calls for a fringe benefit tax break to help New

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Speaker 1: Zealanders pay for the rising cost of health insurance. And

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Speaker 1: this came from a study from the Financial Services Council

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Speaker 1: which found we are twice as likely to ensure our

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Speaker 1: cars than we are ourselves in our health. They reckon

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Speaker 1: only one in four key weis get their health insurance

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Speaker 1: paid for by their employer, with seventy eight percent of

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Speaker 1: insurance people paying for it out of their own pocket.

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Speaker 1: And I know it hurts. Let us go as the

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Speaker 1: founder of Enriched Retirement and joins you. Now, Hello, Liz,

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Speaker 1: good morning. So should employers be paying your health insurance?

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Speaker 1: Or is the whole point of a public health system

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Speaker 1: to be our health insurance?

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Speaker 2: Look, I think our public health system is under extreme

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Speaker 2: and pressure, as we all know, you know, with staff shortages,

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Speaker 2: long waiting lists, you know, the days of relying on

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Speaker 2: that public health system are gone. I think, so we

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Speaker 2: have to take care of ourselves. And I think one

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Speaker 2: of the problems here is that New Zealanders think that

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Speaker 2: a bullet proof, you know, they think, oh, she'll be right,

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Speaker 2: nothing's going to go wrong with me. And they don't

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Speaker 2: tend to put health insurance at the top of their

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Speaker 2: priority list. But it's getting that way because your health

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Speaker 2: is really important. You know, if you don't have good health,

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Speaker 2: then you can't enjoy life. But it may also impact

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Speaker 2: on your ability to work. And that's where I think

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Speaker 2: employers have a vested interest in making sure that their

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Speaker 2: employees are healthy, and part of that is encouraging them

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Speaker 2: to take out health insurance. So I think, yes, you know,

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Speaker 2: having fringe benefit tax apply to those you know, health

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Speaker 2: work related health insurance schemes is a disincentive. It's not

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Speaker 2: heaving us in the right direction if we continue along

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Speaker 2: those lines. So by all means, I think a tax

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Speaker 2: break on that would be extremely helpful to you know,

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Speaker 2: to encourage us to to take the right steps.

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Speaker 1: I don't think we don't invest in health insurance because

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Speaker 1: we think we bulletproof. We don't invest in health insurance

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Speaker 1: because it's so damn expensive.

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Speaker 2: Well, yes, look, but then how do you measure expensive?

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Speaker 2: To me, it's about what's the benefit that you're getting

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Speaker 2: in relation to that expense. So and I think particularly

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Speaker 2: for people who have got, you know, some known health

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Speaker 2: issues or who have some genetics or family history or

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Speaker 2: even history in terms of you know, being heavily involved

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Speaker 2: in sports and that kind of thing which might impact

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Speaker 2: their health. You know, those people are at high risk,

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Speaker 2: and I think in that situation where you're facing a

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Speaker 2: high risk, then it makes a lot of good sense

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Speaker 2: to have health insurance because you know there's there's something

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Speaker 2: going to happen to you potentially down the track which

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Speaker 2: is going to cost you a lot of money or

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Speaker 2: a lot of discomfort because you can't get into the

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Speaker 2: public health system. So in that sense, it's not expensive.

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Speaker 1: Liz, I thank you so much for getting up early today.

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Speaker 1: This goes from a rich retirement. For more from Early

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Speaker 1: Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live to News Talks it

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Speaker 1: be from five am weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.