It's because there's nothing to gain by lowering costs. If you get a bill from a ER for $36 dollars, you'd be less likely to buy a $200 insurance plan, so we h

It's because there's nothing to gain by lowering costs. If you get a bill from a ER for $36 dollars, you'd be less likely to buy a $200 insurance plan, so we have to make ERs as expensive as possible so we can guarantee customers for the poor insurance companies. They won't pay that full 2K anyways.