[jjoonathan]

How do you make sure you're actually getting catastrophic coverage for $3k? The information asymmetry between insurance providers and customers heavily incentivizes the creation of "value" plans that achieve their "value" by appearing to cover more than they actually do. Since only a tiny fraction of customers ever make catastrophic claims, most people will be unaware that they are buying garbage even if a policy were to never pay out (100% lemon-drop rate). Is your due diligence sensitive enough to pick up even a severe 50% lemon-drop rate (affecting, say, 0.5% of customers)?

[mobilefriendly]

Last year I didn't care because I couldn't afford the ACA, and Christian Medishare met the Obamacare requirement to carry insurance or face a tax penalty. The "health care sharing ministry" operates differently than insurance, my concern isn't denial of coverage but that the entire enterprise will collapse. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_sharing_ministry

[kevhito]

I'm not totally clear on the different situations here. I thought the tax penalty was only about $3k for even fairly wealthy families (family of 4, $150k/yr salary). It sounds like you felt you couldn't afford ACA insurance ($17k) and couldn't afford to pay the penalty either, so you went out and purchased $3k of "insurance" you don't actually have any faith in and didn't really want. Am I confused about the penalty amounts? Or you just felt that if you were going to pay $3k, you might as well give it to Christian Medishare?

[DrScump]

If the price of the fine and the price of MediShare are comparable, then any benefits obtained through MediShare are effectively free.