> the monthly payment is about 1/4 of what I was paying for health insurance before I was eligible.

Maybe not, if you take into account the >$500/month subsidy of your Medicare Part A benefits (assuming you had the minimum number of calendar quarters paid in). And your Part B payment (the one usually deducted from your Soc Sec payment) is also partly subsidized unless your income is high enough to trigger IRMAA adjustment.

> defer his Social Security payments until 70, in order to get the higher benefit

People repeat this but when I ran the math on earlier Social Security payments it seems like the accrued $, by the time you're eligible for the higher benefit, is plenty similar as bonus income.

But is Medicare as good as the insurance you had before?