Why Some Americans Are Risking It and Skipping Health Insurance

I’m assuming you mean the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, probably in combination with the related parts of the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010.

[1]https://www.politico.com/story/2014/02/barack-obama-obamacar...

That means they are not obligated to cover your medical expense and you are not allowed to sue them. Repayment is always up to their discretion, and they can spend the money however they want.

They generally reimburse you after you've paid out of pocket, and normally have a lower cap on how much they'll reimbourse, something like up to 250k max.

Its Christian based, they normally only allow Christians to join, and won't pay for injuries caused by activities they don't believe follow their values. Such as STDs from sexual relations outside of marriage, drugs, alchool, fighting, etc.

So what is regulation replaced by? Trust in other Christians. If you trust Christians to be less corrupt and more fair in distributing the pool of money contributed in a fair way to members who most need it. And if you trust other members to be willing to suddenly give extra in case the pool runs out and people still need money for their medical expenses.

In contrast, with normal insurance you have to trust government audit to make sure insurers follow regulations, and trust that they won't wait for you to take them to court to pay up.

Generally, because real insurers have those regulation, they'll want to be very sure they can cover people even in the worst case, which means boosting premiums and deductibles, etc. Also, most normal insurers are for profit and might also want to charge more simply to boost their profit, while health sharing ministries are non for profit, though some of them have been criticised for their founders and employees to pay themselves too big a salary and give themselves too many bonuses.

People (Americans) probably couldn't visualize savings with a national system before these really starting to become populate as of late. Maybe because it was mostly just an idea in our situation? (the burden of one spread across all)

Let's be honest, the Church is probably better at budgeting for this than the Government.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if these become more and more common for the common man that a suggestion to move to a national system is brought up (and taken a bit more seriously).

> What are your thoughts on nationwide healthcare then, as an extended version of CHM, but where the values (aka, rules of elegibility, and what is covered/not covered) are those of the nation instead of those of specific Christian organizations?

I don't like it for a few reasons. First, government is famous for inefficiency and bloat. I am certain the government would do a poor job of good, affordable healthcare. (Rational people must concede this given the evidence today.)

Secondly, cost will be a problem for any system that covers existing conditions; it's the equivalent to buying house insurance when your house has already burned down. That's not insurance.

Third, and most importantly, nationwide insurance is not a self-maintaining community. In small groups that share values, when someone no longer lives according to the community's standards, they're removed from the community. This is not possible in nationwide healthcare.

So, someone abusing the medical system or living a lifestyle contrary to standards of our community cannot continue abusing the system.

This self-maintaining socialistic system works well in smaller communities with shared values, where abusers can be removed from the community. In a nationwide system, this isn't possible, driving up costs further.

> Is it really important for you for it to be an opt in system?

Yes. I do not wished to be coerced into government programs of any kind. That this is both private and optional makes this attractive to me from a libertarian standpoint.

> Is it really important that it be based on a specific interpretation of Christian values instead of the larger US values?

Not a specific interpretation, no. Just the basic interpretation of caring for the sick; a plain interpretation of Jesus' words[0].

[0]: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matthew+25%3A35...

To be part of our community, you must abide by the community's rules. Our values include an ideal of male-female marriage, no sex outside of marriage, no drug use or alcohol abuse, etc. You know, the things we adherents of the Bible have believed for 3500 years. :-)

Interestingly enough, many of our values -- monogamy, heterosexual marriage, no drugs or alcohol abuse -- tend to produce people with fewer health issues.

You don't have to agree with us. If you don't like our values, by all means form your own medical health sharing groups.

When you go to the hospital, you disclose that. "I don't have health insurance, I am self-paid with a health sharing ministry."

I think another major reason is that health sharing ministries don't typically cover pre-existing conditions. That is huge; acquiring health insurance for a pre-existing condition is like buying house insurance after your home has already burned down.

Another reason the cost is lower is that, unlike nationwide healthcare, we're a self-maintaining community. You abide by the communities standards -- which tend to decrease disease -- and you remain in the community. But if you break the community standards, and engage in medically-risky behavior, you're removed from the community.

This works great for smaller groups with shared values. It cannot work in nationwide healthcare. And it's a big reason the cost is so much lower.

[0]: www.chministries.org/downloads/newsletters/CHMApril2013.pdf

Which leads me to the paranoid thought that severe costs of some procedures are a tax on illness. Well, illness is taxing itself, so, by syllogism, that wouldn't even be absurd.

Vis-a-vis.

The problem is that people are now accepting this type of coverage as new normal and also paying arm and leg for it.

It's a damn shame they made an extremely profitable business out of it.

There is a corollary to the law of diminishing marginal utility here. If having health insurance actually meant I didn't have to worry about the impact of future unexpected disasters, then the incredible monthly cost might seem worthwhile; but all it's going to do is push the threshold of disaster upward, so I'd rather manage risk by maximizing flexibility and keep the cash in my pocket instead.

Also, New Zealand is laughably straightforward in terms of governing structure. Hard to have too much duplication (and easy to hit economies of scale) when there's only one Police Force for example. In the US there's the Federal, and the State, and the Municipal level. All with monster bureaucracies.

Observations: Also Kiwi, but live in 'Murica.

Not me. Premiums, as brutal as they are, absolutely pale in comparison to what health care can cost you in the US under the rubric of for-profit health insurance.