I'm very dissatisfied with the quality of the replies to your post so far, a lot of them are deepities about corruption and class. The actual reasons involve a

I'm very dissatisfied with the quality of the replies to your post so far, a lot of them are deepities about corruption and class. The actual reasons involve a whole bunch of factors: - principal-agent problems - health-insurance and hidden cost mean the people paying aren't the people getting the product - concentrated benefits, diffuse costs. There are tons of actors (pharmas, hospitals, insurers, doctors, etc.) each skimming off the top. Each of these is a small enough effect that it's not worth anybody's time to stop it, especially when it's worth it for the skimmer to fight to the death to protect their cut, and together they all add up to massive amounts of waste. - the US healthcare system is a Frankenstein's monster of public and private elements, and has ended up with the worst parts of both - the US healthcare system probably would be better (at least in terms of cost-effectiveness) if it become either more libertarian or more socialized, but since moving a little in either direction would be seen by half the population as the top of a slippery slope towards a dystopia they hate, everybody fights hard to keep it in the local minimum