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Increase the cost to the individual and you’ll have a lot of people deciding that since they’re pretty healthy then they’ll accept the risk and forego the insurance altogether.

Yes. The point is that if we get the government and employers out of it, the costs will actually shrink. I’ve said for decades that the way to make something really expensive is to simply make the person using it NOT the person paying for it. When the people who use doctors and pay for their own health care insurance are one in the same, suddenly you won’t have people willing to pay for a policy that allows you to visit the doctor every time a family member has a stuffy nose. People can get $3,000 deductible policies dirt cheap and only go to the doctor when they really, really need it.

Insurance is supposed to protect you from catastrophic expenses. It is why Lloyd’s of London (arguably the first insurance company) came into existence. A shipping company would buy rather expensive insurance that would protect them from catastrophic loss.

Insurance is not supposed to be “monthly payments” for regular visits (this is very common with dental insurance). Insurance is to protect you from financial catastrophy. If you want something more than that, you should be able to buy it - if you can afford it - just like if you want a swimming pool, a yacht or a Ferrari.

The point is that if we get the government and employers out of it, the costs will actually shrink.

How can the? If a larger and larger percentage of healthy people opt out of health insurance because of the cost then those remaining are, as I pointed out, the ones who need someone to be paying their bills. The percentage of customers for the insurance companies who file few, if any, claims and which cost the company the least amount per year will drop. The percentage of those who file multiple claims and who cost the insurance company the most will rise. Under that cost model it would be financial suicide for a company to reduce their premiums. The opposite will occur.

Insurance, as I said, is risk avoidance. A risk caught early is more easily and cheaply handled than a risk caught late. As any doctor will tell you, health issues caught early are far easily, and inexpensively, treated than health issues caught later. Remove preventative care like physicals, mamograms, colonscopies, innoculations, and routine screenings and health issues will be missed and won't manifest themselves until they become major health problems. Insurance will truly become catastrophic, and companies will be paying six figures for problems that could have been handled for much less. So health insurance truly is something that should be used frequently and not catastrophically.