I’m not that well versed in gene therapy, but for pharmaceuticals the calculus is as follows: It takes billions of dollars and decades for a new drug to be put on the market. In addition to the cost, there’s the risk of the FDA not approving it. Once approved, the drug can essentially be produced for free. The government gives the company the right to charge whatever they want for a set number of years until the patent expires (including much of the research time). After that period, competition is allowed in.

It seems clear to me that costs and profits need to come from somewhere. But I wonder if there is a better system than just making each pill super expensive for a long period of time.