For the record, I’m not American nor live in the US, but I have a 19-year-old son who started attending the University of Chicago this year, studying economics. Just the tuition itself is $70k. My husband and I are lucky enough to be able to afford it - I still believe it’s an outrageous amount of money to attend college.
Administrative bloat. At my university, if my lab lands a grant, 60% goes to the university and only 40% is used for actual research. There’s a long chain of people whose jobs are to answer emails, and they all need to be paid.