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Most Americans who want health insurance have it. Insurance pays the the bulk of a huge bill. The individual pays a small fraction of a huge bill through deductibles, co-payments and co-insurance (depends on the policy.) This fraction can be paid from the savings a FIRE retiree would have accumulated without significantly affecting their investment income.

The individual pays a larger fraction of smaller medical bills, but because the bills are small, this is also affordable to someone with savings. The majority of medical events are inexpensive.

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Everything you said is the opposite of reality in America in 2020.

[1123581321]

This Wikipedia article is a good summary, especially the breakdown of uninsured populations. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_insurance_coverage_in...

There are a number of reports of out-of-pocket spending and insurance plan policy detail is generally available. Do you have a preferred source for that data? This conversation is about FIRE, but a summary of the prevelance of burdensome healthcare costs in respect to the broader US population was published here: https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2...

Again, these are just gentle introductions to the data. I would be happy to read what you’re looking at.