re: Why does the healthcare debate essentially revolve around like 4% of Americans?

Nice try.

The chart shows our cost growth has been at or below OECD average for nearly 2 decades/

How many?
All.

100%

Head count irrelevant.
All are covered.

England
France.
Germany.

What's the obesity rate of France, GB, and the Scandinavian countries with Universal Healthcare?

How active is the average individual in those countries compared to here?

What's the diet like over there? Here?

What's the racial makeup there? Here?

And of course there's the whole population thing.

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Look, I have sympathy for those with pre-existing conditions, but why must they get priority over the 85%+ of Americans who simply want lower premiums and costs?

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Look at the bright side, you wont have to pay a lot until youre really sick. If you get really sick you wont have to worry about paying high premiums for very long, though your estate might. It all balances out.

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And of course there's the whole population thing.

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This argument actually lends more credence to individual states having healthcare rather than the federal govt.

There are more people in Europe than the US.

Here's another chart:

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There has never been one word about cost to consumer of heath care by gop.
Instead the proposal caps spending per capita.
It just means states will get less money to spend on medicaid people.
There is nothing in it that reduces the costs of services.

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Has Obamacare reduced the cost of services? Has Obamacare reduced the cost of drugs?

I thought this was about health insurance.

Graham/Cassidy will reduce the cost of insurance premiums for those in the individual market for states who choose to implement the right solutions. If the states choose to keep Obamacare or implement single payer...you are fricked. Otherwise your premiums have no where to go but down.

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The "uninsurable" are only uninsurable if you allow insurance companies to exclude them.

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Nope. The uninsurable are uninsurable because their risk is too high. In fact, it's not a risk at all, it's a certainty.

We're going to have a hard time having any sensible discussion if you don't know what a risk is.

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Every other OECD nation guarantees all citizens healthcare

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Nope. They do no such thing. They ration (deny) care all the time. .

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If we were to start with the proposition that all citizens get insurance

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then it's not insurance. And it ceases to be a tool to manage risk.

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the incentive will be there to finally bring our inefficiencies in healthcare spending under control.

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Huh? You believe insurance companies have incentive to keep prices high?

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We get it backwards by trying to get costs down first before expanding coverage. It needs to work the other way.

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You're confusing costs and prices. Costs aren't really effected by number of people covered by insurance. A hip implant doesn't get cheaper to manufacturer because a person has insurance.

Expanding coverage drives costs up for anyone that doesn't get expensive treatment. And the simple fact that a small minority drive the majority of the expenses means that covering them will raise, not lower prices to paying majority. It's simple math.

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we could still get better access, less cost growth, and similar quality to what we have now.

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Let's see your model.

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But we'd have to make peace with the idea that po' folks deserve care

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Is this a joke? They already get it. At other's expense. So much of it, they are driving prices up.