The $1300-1800 numbers are the total. The employer pays most of that, and you're left to pay something around $600.

That fully covers preventative care like regular checkups, standard vaccines, and regular screenings.

If you're in your regular checkup and there's an issue, it's no longer free. Any actual issues usually require you to pay around 20% of the inflated cost. However, you get to use a special, untaxed account to pay it. So you end up paying roughly 15%, and the government chips in 5% (through not charging you income taxes on that portion.)

If you spend somewhere around $10k out of pocket (in addition to your $600/month fees, and your employer's $900/month fees and the government's ~$700/month they lose by not taxing any of this), THEN everything is free, as long as it's approved.

So the real benefit of health insurance is that if you get cancer you only have to pay $~20k a year for as long as you keep your job. Try not to get fired for taking to much time for chemotherapy.

And after you go through all this, there are still complications such as which doctors and pharmacies you're allowed to go to, but most importantly, the health insurance company has a large say in what medications you're allowed to take.

If you don't have health insurance and you get sick you probably just go bankrupt.

Another talking point that doesn't get discussed enough. I didn't realize my next job didn't cover until the next calendar month after the start date and that three week gap was long enough that I'm out of therapy and need to try to reinitiate.