One evening my daughter hit the top of her nose in a cabinet edge. it became blue and swollen and we took her to the emergency.

everything went smooth: a doctor saw her and advised us that nobody knows if it is broken or not so the only advisable course of action is to play as it was broken ( ice packs on and of to keep he swelling in check )

Several days later we received the notices from our insurance, total bill is ~ $600 and they paid $24.00 - the rest is for us to pay.

So my question is how it came to this state? why can't we go to a doctor and pay his fee and go home? I mean a lot of doctors would be happy to see somebody for 2 min and tell them to put ice on the spot on and of each 15 minutes. and to receive $100-$150 . I mean even it is in the evening and on the weekend it was for a couple of minutes. No procedures were made. No prescriptions were written

We drove 15 miles one way to get to the emergency

If there was no health care system there would be at least 120 doctors in 15 miles radius from us . which would be happy to receive so much money for a couple of minutes of work.

I pay $400 a month just for my health care plan.
that comes to a 5000 a year

I had to go to a doctor 3 times in the lat 2 years.
my wife did not go there once in the same period.
My daughters went ~ 10 times each (for their shots and for the routine examinations).

in these two years I paid 10000 to the plan and at least 1000 in copay s .

if I paid $100 to a doctor each time and did not have an insurance at all I would have paid less than fourth of the above only .

Who is benefiting from this whole arrangement?