What happens when you get diagnosed with a chronic health issue? The unexpected large expense of initial diagnosis and treatment might be covered but then your budgeted healthcare costs will barely make a dent in long term treatment. How do you cover a $15k monthly infusion? Or a $4k monthly pharmacy bill?

With the high deductible plan setting a ceiling on their health care costs, presumably. I'm not a fan personally but some people do a savings account to cover incidentals / the deductible portion.

Yeah, but that only works for a chronic issue that doesn't put you out of work. HDHPs are still on an annual deductible after all. I know I have a bit of a bias since it's my industry, but make sure to carry long term disability insurance if at all possible. Getting sick in this country is complicated when you really dig into it.

> Insurance should be for unexpected large expenses. Not routine, predictable health care. Treat that like your your rent, groceries, etc. i.e. something you budget for.

That's fine, budget for an annual physical and maybe a couple of sick visits. But that's not what's making people broke, and is not the risk people are concerned with. Unless you're young and healthy, there's very little that is predictable about health care. Also, HDHPs aren't available through the ACA market in every state - they're not in mine, for instance.

We need everyone in the risk pool, and we need to get costs under control. It is ridiculous that in the richest country in the world, someone could lose everything due to a medical condition. That's the wrong kind of lottery ticket out of the middle class.