It’s open enrollment for 2023 health insurance for lots of folks — a time when you might find yourself asking: what good is health insurance anyway? 

One listener wrote to us about his son, a student with no income. Dad asks, If the son could get charity care (financial assistance) at his local hospital….  should he bother getting health insurance? 

The big picture question: If you’re broke, and can’t get insurance from work, what are your best options? 

The big picture answer:  It totally depends!  

• Do you live in a state that expanded Medicaid?
• What are the financial-assistance policies like at the hospitals around you?
• What kind of health care do you know you’re going to need?

We had expert help here:   Karen Pollitz, a senior fellow at the Kaiser Family Foundation, and . Jared Walker, founder of Dollar For, and a super-expert on charity care.  

If you want to go deeper:

• We did a three-part series on picking health insurance in our First Aid Kit newsletter. Start here. 
• An episode from last year explored some more dos and don’ts for picking health insurance.
• In a 2018 episode, we talked with another listener — a “financial therapist” — who had her own deep questions about health insurance. 

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Here, go for it.

• Here’s a transcript of this episode.
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