Regulation

Intellectual property laws promote political rent-seeking like this.

"But unlike profit-seeking, rent-seeking doesn’t create wealth, it merely transfers it from one party to another. Whoever wins rents by using political means may be better off, but others, potential competitors, but more importantly consumers, will be made decidedly worse off. The latter will pay higher prices, get poorer quality, or have fewer choices because political means are quite effective in discouraging rival entrepreneurs. The results of rent-seeking also stifle the competitive discovery process, so that consumers are less likely to become aware of more efficient methods or better providers.⁴
Thus the resources that competitive rent-seekers spend in their quest for these politically created rents are indeed wasted because they are used to produce an outcome in which nothing of value is created. Indeed, rent-seeking of this kind destroys wealth."

We all pay the price.

"But an even more serious problem at the level of social norms is that rent-seeking tends over time to encourage growing numbers of ordinary people to engage in it, trying to acquire political power either to gain advantages over the less powerful or as redress against the mounting advantages and political power of others. It thereby sets into motion a troubling dynamic that over time progressively erodes respect for the rule of law, limited government, and private property."

Boy does that describe the economic history of the US.