You’re paying into a pool for the neediest to use. The social contract being that you implicitly admit you will one day be needy, no matter how healthy you live your life. Thus, you willingly throw your money away when you’re young and healthy and you do it smiling.
> You’re paying into a pool for the neediest to use.
Yes, that's the definition of insurance. Insurance company takes money from everyone (say, for car insurance) but only pays out to a few (those who crash their car).
As any insurance broker will happily tell you, the smaller the pool of people you belong to, the higher the premiums because they can't spread the risk as wide. Thus, a 100K+ employee company can buy health insurance for their employees at a better rate than a 4 person startup.
The optimal group size for an insurance pool is: everyone in the whole country.
Maximum pool size, risk is spread as widely as possible, cost is minimized.
