No one in America seems to understand how close they are to financial ruin from surprisingly common stuff. My wife has lingering complications from the birth of our last child. My statement of benefits from the insurance company for 2016 shows that they paid $97,000 for her this year, and this was at least the third year in a row at that level. Fortunately, I already had pretty good insurance when this whole mess started for us, and we aren't really at risk of losing it. But I can tell you that it is a significant factor any time I consider changing jobs.