If you would rather have an extra, say, $3k/yr* in salary, rather than having that exact same amount of money go toward an employer-provided health plan that wo

If you would rather have an extra, say, $3k/yr* in salary, rather than having that exact same amount of money go toward an employer-provided health plan that would, if you tried to obtain it on your own, cost $10k/yr, then I think you might have a problem with math. Note that I don't just mean the math of $10k > $3k, because I know some people think that they can save money by just not having health coverage. This is also being bad at math: specifically, statistics. You won't win, especially since you need regular checkups to make sure you aren't starting to develop something that's cheap to nip in the bud, but massively expensive to treat later. * No actual numbers were harmed in the making of this post. If you think these specific numbers are unrealistic, feel free to substitute other actual values, but the rough ratios should still be in the right ballpark.