Your money matters: Weekend report: New medical plans for small businesses carry investment options, but also risks
They're here.</br></br>After years of debate, tax-free "medical savings accounts" for the self-employed and people who work for small businesses finally arrived on New Year's Day.</br></br>Under a four-year pilot program, more than one million people could use MSAs to pay for routine health-care expenses in connection with special, high-deductible health-insurance policies. Money contributed to the accounts by workers or their employers would be used to pay for medical expenses until the deductible has been met and the insurance policies begin to pay.</br></br>MSAs also offer a potential new way for some people to boost their savings because money that isn't used for medical expenses can continue to grow tax-deferred.</br></br>Some insurers and banks are already pitching the accounts as a vehicle for long-term investing. In addition to supersafe cash or money-market accounts, they are offering mutual funds and, in some cases, individual stocks and bonds. The companies say they want to offer people investments with competitive returns in a tax-sheltered environment similar to an individual retirement account.