> Maybe if I told the hospital I didn't have insurance they would have let me pay in cash too, but probably not 11 years ago I had a minor fracture on shoulder

> Maybe if I told the hospital I didn't have insurance they would have let me pay in cash too, but probably not 11 years ago I had a minor fracture on shoulder from a fall. Ironically it was during a 12 week period where I opted out of offered COBRA coverage between gigs (Mainly due to the fact that the COBRA was nearly $800/mo and I’m a cheap bastard) Went to ER, explained that I didn’t have insurance but could pay cash. Also because I was curious I asked what my charge would have been if had I had the COBRA. Cash price was roughly $1300. With COBRA the charge would have been $2400 for the 3 months of coverage, plus another $1000 for the ER visit, but the insurance would have paid another $4K to the ER if I remember correctly. Those numbers aren’t precise, but they are in the ballpark at least relative to each other. No doubt I hit a sweet spot and if I was injured to a greater degree…COBRA would have won the economic toss, but for my one incident where I could test cash price medical care, cash price worked out.