Wealth & Wellness

A 3-minute read on pricing the checkup you keep postponing the way an actuary would.

Most people pay insurance premiums without complaint: small, regular costs accepted because the uncovered version of a rare event is ruinous. Then they postpone the annual physical for two years, which is the same contract with better terms: an hour and a copay against the class of conditions that are cheap when caught early and ruinous when caught late.

Consider what the premium buys. Elevated blood pressure, drifting glucose, a mole that changed shape: the expensive versions of these announce themselves years after the inexpensive versions were detectable in a twenty-minute appointment. The payout on a physical isn’t a diagnosis. It’s the option to intervene at early-stage prices.

Why does this premium go unpaid? Because it’s billed in time and mild awkwardness instead of dollars, and because a clean result feels like money wasted. But a clean result is what most premiums buy; nobody cancels homeowner’s insurance because the house keeps not burning down.

The experiment, then, is to treat it like autopay: book next year’s appointment before leaving this year’s, so the premium collects itself. One decision, made once: the same trick that makes every other good contribution schedule survive.

P.S. Tomorrow: what checking your portfolio too often costs you, measured in returns and in sleep.