Legalized, mandatory gambling

I sometimes think I should not try to write something when I am right in the middle, and other times, I think that that is when I am at my best.  The down side is, I may fire something off that I would like to pull back later.  I guess that is the beauty of the delete and backspace buttons.  I always read through my posts several times before I "publish" them, but I wonder if I give out too much info inadvertently.
     This morning, my gripe is about insurance.  Now, don't get me wrong..... I think it is a good plan, overall, but do we all know that this is legalized gambling? 
     Let me explain my thought process, and anyone who wants can straighten me out if they feel I am way off base.
     Insurance companies make their money (read in "their fortunes") off the most careful and healthy and cautious individuals.  That's just the way it works, but that's is not the only source.  They play the odds.  plain and simple.  they base their premiums for any given policy or type of coverage on the statistical odds of having to pay that out.  Hence extra riders to have flood insurance if you live anywhere near a river flood plain.
     Take this week.  We have had an accident.  Along with other things, you could call it the week from ..... well.  But my focus is on car insurance and the like.  Liz got in an accident.  She didn't cause it, but she couldn't avoid it.  Short version:  Car behind her passes her and the next car in a blind "s" curve, not knowing that there is an intersection (stoplight) just past the curve.  Car A jumps back in the right lane, and slams on the brakes to make the stop.  Car B (Jeep) locks 'em up, manages to miss car A, but Liz (car C) can't make the stop and creams the back of Jeep (car B).  Light turns green, car A leaves without a scratch or a trace, leaving Liz and Jeep to trade insurance info.  Police arrive, issue no citations, because both witnesses explain car A, but of course have no ID info.  My car is totalled!
     Our insurance coverage will probably pay for what is left of the car loan.  It is only a year old, but we had a big down payment, and our loan remaining is about the same amount as the bluebook.  So how is this gambling?  When we bought the car, we paid a hefty premium for GAP insurance.  We gambled that we could avoid a wreck for at least 6 months, on the payments we make.
     You see, GAP cost us about $700 when we bought the car, and because of where our loan balance is right now, 1 year later, they will probably pay NOTHING, because our loan amount and our primary insurance are right about even.
     If we had kept that $700 in an envelope for the last 12 months, we would at least have $700 to almost cover the deductible on our primary coverage.  To say nothing of trying to come up with a down payment for a replacement car.  In other words, our years of paying faithfully into our "insurance" slot machine have saved us from having to deal with a loan amount on a dead car, but leaves us nothing with which to replace it, and our lovely GAP policy would have been useful 6 months ago, but will be (or would have become) even less valuable each month from this time forward.
     Maybe I am too naive.  Or maybe we just constantly get the cheapest coverage available not realizing the "bonanza" available at the next premium level.  Or maybe I am too honest.  I hear people claim that their insurance coverage gave them a great boost.  "look at the new car I got after my accident"  Or that medical insurance had some "left over" and they used it to buy new furniture.  For me, insurance has always been a gamble, and like most gambling, the "mark" loses.
     The gamble is that we pay into a system ( by law, many times) in which we only "win" if our mishaps, bad health, damages happen very early on, or continuously.  But most of us try to stay healthy, we drive carefully, we try not to build houses in the same flood zones that have been hit every year for the last 3 decades ( I said "most of us"), and in the end, our money is meant to protect the banks and goverment agencies, not us.
     Of course, I say this not in ignorance.  I know certain insurance is a great blessing when a house is destroyed or a child becomes very ill and requires surgery, or needs insulin his whole life.  I know car insurance is a "game" of chance, and it lives because it protects the money, but for those of us who have little, it is frustrating.  It doesn't really offer us a hand up when "life" happens, when our tired fingertips threaten to slip from our precarious perch on the edge of the precipice, it just keeps the banks from coming over with a hammer.  I guess I can even see that as a blessing.  Eventually.