The US is usually in the top 3 spending per student (beaten only by small countries that represent statistical outliers like Norway or Luxemburg), so really, it spends the most. Yet, as many are quick to point out, all that money results in educational outcomes well below many European countries and also many Asian countries that spend far, far less.
Luckily, this is researched extensively, and schools must publish budgets. Typically, spending on 'instruction' is >60% of the expenditures, almost all of that is salaries and benefits. Capital outlay is usually around 8-10%, support services and administration around 10%, operations and maintenance around 10%, and around 5% for transportation/bussing.
Contrary to the typical claims that 'administration' or capital costs suck up all the money, the majority of the money does go to teachers' salary.
The US is just a pretty expensive country. The cost of labor (highly correlated with wages) is pretty high compared to Europe even outside the coastal cities. Maybe not 4x though.
It would also be interesting to compare educational outcomes in particular US states to particular European countries. I suppose that the quality of education may be as unevenly distributed across the US as it is across Europe.
The US is usually in the top 3 spending per student (beaten only by small countries that represent statistical outliers like Norway or Luxemburg), so really, it spends the most. Yet, as many are quick to point out, all that money results in educational outcomes well below many European countries and also many Asian countries that spend far, far less.