College: loans are available to everyone and cannot be disbursed except under death. They are also risk-free to institutions as the federal government guarantees student loans. Consequence: Colleges can charge as much as they want, because students can borrow as much as they want, because the government will get their money one way or the other. Outcome: radically higher college costs, radically higher student loan debt.

Healthcare: consumers and providers have no way to negotiate prices, insurance companies and manufacturers maximize shareholder value. Consequence: massive price increases. Outcome: Insurance as retention tool, healthcare as social striator.

Transportation: Increased fuel economy and safety standards, combined with comfort additions to cope with increased commutes, raise the median price of a car. Consequence: a median price increase from $21k to $38k ("cheap" cars in 1980 were cheaper than cheap cars today, but were also less safe, less reliable and less comfortable). Outcome: greater used market, greater repairs, lower sales of new cars, higher margins of new cars.

Housing: Lower interest rates lead to fewer opportunities for investment has led to a rise in real estate prices. When borrowing money gets cheaper, big purchases get cheaper. Elizabeth Warren has a different take: the general decline of American schools, due to the decline in investement in American schools, has led to hot-spotting of advantageous school districts which are are paid for by property taxes. As a consequence, houses in good school districts have gone up precipitously while houses everywhere else have just gone up.

Government price fixing is a shitty band-aid in this case. What are the root causes?

College: stop guaranteeing student loans, and allow students to disburse college debt in bankruptcy.

Healthcare: treat it like a utility. That's what medicare/medicaid are already.

Transportation: tax vehicles by curb weight. A Honda CRX got 80mpg in 1987. It also weighed 1700 lbs. Even a Civic weighed 600lb less in 1987. Reduce weight, reduce operating cost, reduce materials.

Housing: stop pretending that every human is entitled to own a house. Housing is owned by municipalities throughout much of Europe. If we did that in the US it would definitely put a roof on prices. If the federal government purchased houses in distressed areas and leased or sold them to "pioneers" you might see vast swaths of hipsters rewilding Appalachia. There are a number of ways to deal with housing, but they all start by not treating housing as a bank.