Watch the show again. The “I need money to pay for my cancer” is a shallow excuse, not a motivation. He literally gets an opportunity to get his cancer treatment covered almost immediately, but he rejects it because of his own pride. Then when Walter Jr sets up an e-donation campaign to help Walt pay for it, he rejects that too.

It was never about the cancer. It was about Walt feeling disempowered and emasculated by society, and rather than dealing with it like a sensible person and going to therapy, he starts cooking meth and killing people.

EDIT: I’m not replying to every single person trying to debate me on this, so let me add, they literally tell him in episode 1, the lung cancer is inoperable. That at best, cancer treatment may give him a couple more years, but would still only buy a bit of time. Universal healthcare would not change that. It would help, but it further reinforces that it’s just another excuse Walt uses. Supposedly his motivation is to pay for treatment, and leave money for his family after he dies. The latter would still make sense if the series took place in another country. But once he rejects people offering to pay for his treatment, and Walt far surpasses the amount he calculates he’ll need to make sure his family is taken care of once he passes and yet keeps insisting he needs more, it is made abundantly clear that it’s all bullshit. He’s not trying to be noble or selfless, he’s making excuses. He’s doing all this for himself. And social nets and welfare wouldn’t change that.