Blame it on the cost-plus contract. NASA paid cost-plus to ULA and the ilk initially (think 60's -90s) mainly because rocketry was a very new field and it was

Blame it on the cost-plus contract. NASA paid cost-plus to ULA and the ilk initially (think 60's -90s) mainly because rocketry was a very new field and it was near impossible to reliably estimate the final cost the manufacturer would incur in fulfilling the contract, so NASA just said "spend whatever you want and we'll pay your spend plus 6%". However it's well known now how much researching and building rockets costs, so cost-plus contracts are, essentially a very bad contract cost model. It's mainly because ULA and such have become _far_ too comfortable on their half-a-century monopoly and simply don't want their scam to end.