So I haven't thought this through to the end, but I'd like your thoughts.

Basically, insurance is a fucking scam. Everyone is encouraged to give their money to an insurance company on a regular basis in case something like an accident, theft, natural disaster, illness etc etc afflicts them and they haven't got the readies to address it. The industry relies on the majority of people paying more money in than they ever get out of it, and this creates massive profits.

Why not have some system that works kind of the same but without the profits? So everybody pays in based on their ability to pay (perhaps just do it through income tax), and all the money, minus the costs to staff and administer it, is given to people who find themselves in need of it due to an incident.

Perhaps everyone has a baseline personal state insurance policy, perhaps the on property, contents, car etc - maybe those, maybe no those, maybe others idk. Extras, like insuring your legs if you're a pro footballer, or insuring your business of you own one, means you pay extra into the system.

Haven't thought this through obviously - that's why I'm posting. Does anything like this already exist - other than national insurance, state pensions, the NHS etc? Is this what a credit union is? I have no idea what a credit union is.

Ideology-bants aside, would be genuinely interested to hear what the right and left wingers of dis had to say about this.