[PaulHoule]

The U.S. government seems to be worse than the others.

For instance when Europeans hear how much it costs to build a subway in the U.S. often they are shocked. Heck, the Green Party in my town got shocked when it heard how much it costs to build a bus shelter.

Also government is involved in healthcare in other countries too. The difference is that our government spends more than the others and then the private sector spends more money on top of that.

Thus government itself is not a problem so much as the U.S. government is particularly broken.

[John_Innocent]

Where do you get the idea that government is not involved in subway building in a big way in the US? Perhaps there are more legal/regulatory barriers in place to build a subway in the US than in Europe.

>Thus government itself is not a problem so much as the U.S. government is particularly broken.

The cost disease is affecting all developed economies, not just the US, and it affects almost exclusively government dominated industries. If all governments are broken, then that suggests something inherently wrong with government.

[anonymoushn]

Can you use this model to explain why government-involved health care, education, and subway construction is much cheaper in all other developed countries than in the United States?

[John_Innocent]

I don't know but if I had to speculate, I'd say the US has less efficient government, because of factors like greater wealth (more complacency toward waste and corruption) and a larger and less homogenous population (a less coherent public debate).

With respect to the second point, I hypothesize that generally central economic planning becomes less efficient as the economy it plans grows larger. I suspect this is related to Dunbar's number.

[PaulHoule]

More to the point, it is usually the government that funds, builds and operates the subway.