Some of the uninsured just don't want health insurance

Like this blogger:

Excuse me, but I don’t have health insurance, by choice. And when I or other members of my family get sick, we go to see our doctor and we pay for it out of pocket.
It’s cheaper that way.
We don’t dump our medical expenses onto our fellow citizens/taxpayers and I have a strong feeling that we’re not alone. Surely there are other people who don’t have health insurance but don’t go the hospital emergency room route when they need to see a doctor.

Comments

aging
Wouldn’t you like to feel the comfort that it’s already taken care of. What happens if you need expensive surgery and you don’t have 60,000 dollars in you wallet to pay for all of it at that time. Are you really going to have that much saved up. It’s ok to pay the small stuff out of pocket like checks ups but the insurance is there for the big things like removing and kidney and such.
Anonymous
Agreed. It’s easy to go without insurance when everyone’s healthy. Good luck when that’s not the case.
Anonymous
“Health Insurance” can be something of a ripoff. You pay a dollar to your “insurance” company so it can keep 20 cents and give 80 cents to your doctor for the routine and fairly predictable expenses of living. This is the typical health plan which isn’t really insurance. It takes a cut for brokering predictable expenses. Insurance is purchased as a hedge against unexpected and unaffordable expenses. What most of us do is equivalent to buying car insurance that covers oil changes. Logically, it is going to be more expensive than leaving them out and purchasing directly.
The problem with the logic is that hospitals charge the uninsured such exorbitant prices compared to what they are willing to accept from insured patients. So, while I can afford even large unexpected costs, I buy insurance as protection against being overcharged by the hospital.
We in healthcare complain about being pushed around by insurance companies, but then force our patients to use them for routine expenses by not following the simple and fair policy of charging everyone the same thing, except for where we elect to extend charity.
It can be a rational decision to be uninsured and people should be free to make it. If you are uninsured for 20 years, and then have a major medical problem that costs you 100,000 dollars, at todays insurance rates you have still saved about 100,000 or more. Some people really can self-insure–as long as you are a saver.
If you are not a saver, then what you are doing is puting the local hospitals with their EMTALA obligations at risk without their consent. It is legal, but immoral.
RJS
I am in the process of starting my own business. My partner and I are looking at health insurance premiums that are anywhere from $250/month/person to $550/mo/person. This is a lot of money.
But it’s not nearly what I would have to pay for even one trip to the ER.
Okulus
It isn’t a rational understanding to not have at least catastrophic coverage. Abstract notions of how well you could invest your insurance money if you spent it on something interest-bearing ignores the reality that not everyone’s illness has the good grace to present only when they have enough saved to pay that theoretical $100,000 hospital bill. And for many that day is never. If this idea had any worth, then why isn’t there already a market for a convertible universal life insurance policy that lets you do just that: save in an interest-bearing and cash-value accruing account that will offer cartastrophic coverage but which if not used can be assigned as a death benefit just like any other kind of life insurance policy? I suspect no company would find it worthwhile.
Anonymous
These kind of posts are really from people who have no clue whatsoever.
Get cancer and then come back and tell us how you are so happy to not have insurance and how you gladly pay your own way.
Michael Rack, MD
“Get cancer and then come back and tell us how you are so happy to not have insurance and how you gladly pay your own way.”
Health insurance is nice in theory but in reality often falls far short. Pay insurance all your life, get cancer, and find out that the necessary treatment is considered “experimental” and not covered. Or find out that the treatment center near your home is considered “out of network” and you have to travel 3 hours several times a week for your cancer treatment.
I don’t want some insurance company telling me what treatment is covered or not covered, trying to weasel out of treating injuries- saying they are work-related or someone else’s fault.
I currently have health insurance through my work, but I would gladly be a saver and go without insurance if I could pay the “insured charge” and not the rip-off rates that medical providers are forced (by insurance contracts and MEdicare regulations)to charge the uninsured.
Anonymous
A Canadian example…I have complete tax-supported coverage for surgeries (excluding cosmetic), for all primary care, for all diagnostic scans, for most othe treatments/categories.
I also have private coverage for prescription drugs that are not covered by the provincial government, massage therapy and chiropractic work, glasses, dental work, etc.
The major problem in our healthcare system is long wait times. This can probably be resolved by restoring funding levels to their previous 1990 levels, and making sure the funding is going to the right areas.
Maybe (just maybe) insurance costs would go down in the U.S. if the government started paying for some of these services.
A lot of the major North American corporations who have operations in Canada (ex. General Motors) believe in preserving our nationalized healthcare plan because it saves them money in insurance for their employees. Yes, a government-supported program actually helps out the private industry.
very cold
If your hit with a terminal illness and you have no insurance what are you going to do? Will you pay for all the days you are in the hospital. Some people just think they are invincible to sickness. Good luck when the blogger gets sick.
Anonymous
Instead of being naked, or fully intentionally uninsured, by a high deducitlbe plan or a catastrophic coverage plan.
Other option, medical tourism.
Anonymous
In my family the tradition for generations has been, when diagnosed with terminal illness, to refuse further medical care except for home care and die at home. Why should we help pay for the general culture’s refusal to come to terms with death?
We always paid all our medical bills, even when catastrophic events occured and, 50 years ago, we were frankly poor–it just took years sometimes but they all got paid without bill collectors being involved. We just don’t want to pay for the fools who don’t have the guts to go home and face death like a grownup when the time comes or for all the malingerers, drug addicts, self-abusers and weenies who think they are entitled to problem free lives.
Anonymous
Best insurance in the world, you are still going to die
Anonymous
“Maybe (just maybe) insurance costs would go down in the U.S. if the government started paying for some of these services.”
Please point to one government run entity where costs have been contained in the past.

Some of the uninsured just don’t want health insurance

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