Do you have health insurance

Mrs. Whitman is the type who would go to the doctor for a hangnail, so, yes, we carry it. And we use it.

 

Yes. And it's breathtakingly expensive.

But saving the cost of insurance and rolling it all up into some sweet 401 K sounds great until you realize that a single bad diagnosis for you or your spouse or your kids could run into the millions.

It's a terrible broken system we have here, whether you compare it to Canada or Germany or France or literally anywhere else in the developed world.

 

Here's what I find fascinating about those thoughts. You're not really worried about the actual event (illness or injury) that might happen to you and the life-changing misery and pain it might cause.

You're worried about . . . can I pay for it?

That's so fucked.

If I have a "million-dollar" illness . . . chances are I'm fucked every which way even before the first collection agency starts calling.

Forty-eight hours after breaking two bones, I finally decided, "Fuck, maybe something's really wrong here" and hobbled to the hospital.

 

Am actually worried by both. The two things aren't mutually exclusive.

The $50,000 appendix.

The $350,000 brain tumor.

The $600,000 cancer that metastasizes from one organ to the next to the next.

The transplant. The Caesarian. The joint replacement. The bypass.

The question isn't 'if,' but 'when?'

 

Mostly in the Medicare years, thankfully.

 

Hadn't looked at it that way much. You do have a point. I guess my mindset is that if I'm very sick or very injured, the last thing I want to worry about is how to pay for it, or how to keep my family from going broke trying to keep me alive.

 

In the risk-benefit analysis, you are not just weighing the probability of a health event but the possible magnitude of that health event.
If you opt to not have health insurance and you have no health event, you save money.
If you opt to not have health insurance and you have a relatively minor health event, you might still save money.
If you opt to not have health insurance and you have a major health event, you might lose money, in addition to the emotional and other consequences.
If you opt to not have health insurance and have a major or catastrophic health event, you might financially cripple yourself or your family, in addition to the emotional and other consequences.

It's not an A or B equation, and the possible negative outcomes financially can increases by orders of magnitude.

 

Just over two years ago, our twins spent three months in the NICU at a specialty children's hospital.
Three months ago one of them was at the same place in ICU for five days.
health insurance = good

 

Sorry to hear it, Buck.

Hope everyone is OK.

 

Yes, everyone well. I just intended as anecdotal on value of health insurance.

 

Glad to hear it.

 

Yep. Terrible, broken system. And the GOP loves it.