Why Does America Spend More on Health Care than Countries with Socialized Medicine?

From 1978 to 2008, the United States has spent an ever-increasing percentage of its GDP on health care (with the exception of a flat period in the late-1990s). Since about 1980, we've spent a higher percentage of our GDP on health care than any OECD country.

For the last year or so there's been this sometimes deafening outcry over our perceived slip toward socialism. Meanwhile, we've already spending far more on health care than countries where health care actually is socialized. It makes sense that we would spend more, given that we're a richer nation, and most countries are trending upward in spending, but the gap seems to be getting wider, no?

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Via Marginal Revolution