Is a [similar] scenario likely to happen in the US in the next 5 years?
Likely? Oh heavens, no. But, 35 years ago, we started major cuts to funds for college grants -- the limits were jacked up by multiples, but it was all debt. (And, "debt" to be backed by the U.S. government, to make it palatable to the initial banks -- who were no more than salesmen at that point.) That seemed a disaster -- we all knew -- and "Nothing good will come of this!" Here it is Lo! those many years later, and we still have starving students, faculty on welfare, but now we have college administrations bloated beyond belief.
Same thing in medicine -- where HMOs went from being MEMBER organizations to being bought out by doctors [concerned about (truly-skyrocketing) medical malpractice costs from 'treble-damages' on "pain & suffering"] to then being taken over by the insurance companies -- the ones intended to be fought/bargained-with in the first place. We still have health underfunded, we still have doctors and nurses quitting the profession, but now we have *massively* bloated insurance leeches bleeding the American populace.
The cures for these things (like, uniform treatment of customers, freely-available prices/information, etc) were plain to us freshly minted economists/policy wonks. It was easy-peasy textbook stuff. When Milton Friedman wrote a populist piece in 1987, I thought, "Finally! Uncle Milty'll set 'em straight!" (This sez 2001, but I remember it well before my kids were born, in 1994.
https://www.hoover.org/research/how-cure-health-care-0 )
Smart, MARKET economies can do stupid things. Even things that make you scratch your head and think, "This will not go well!" But it can take years for the horror to show up.
When the horror shows up, all bets are off. We had our National Debt horror and our College Debt horror and our National Health Finance horror put off for 10 years by our Credit Crisis horror. As we're pretty much out of that one, eh?? These others are coming to the 'fore.
Is a [similar] below likely to happen in the US in the next 5 years?
Likely? No. But is it on the horizon? It most certainly is. And we'd all better be paying better attention than we have. Our little "experiment" with democracy remains only an experiment, after all.....