You could go your whole life, and never miss that insurance card.
OTOH, you're always 1 sarcoma away from lifetime financial disaster. My 1st wife had cancer and that little card paid over $100k before she died. Without it, I would have been left with bills I could never hope to pay.
Can you be sure that you will always get home from work without tangling with a truck?
With premiums what they are today, you could pay off that medical bill in under 10 years instead of paying the premium.
I would have no problem paying a reasonable premium for catastrophic coverage, and pay out of pocket for dr's visits, prescriptions etc.
The problem is two fold. People who go to the dr. for every sniffle, and people who are on expensive medications for a variety of things that are based on their own bad decisions.
Boner medicines, birth control pills, fat pills (cholesterol, high blood pressure, etc., et al) and so on should be 100% covered by those who choose the medicine.
But there is a whole lot of personal responsibility that would be required to drop medical costs, and I don't see that happening with most people in our society.
