How does that concept of the Black Swan go?  Something like you never expect and then there it is among the white swans - a surprise we didn't anticipate even though after the fact, historians can link the hows and whys with relative ease. 

Doctors have been my primary focus throughout this debacle in the works.  This article from the Wall Street Journal forecasts the shortages already happening but that are bound to multiply.  Personally I prefer my doctors to have been trained in the USA and not in Bangladesh.  Always check out the degrees on the wall and feel a greater degree of confidence when I see Northwestern University, Harvard Medical School or UCLA Medical School, though it isn't the entire ball of wax.

Quote from the article: "As a specialist physician I will suggest that until primary care physicians can 70-80% of what most specialists make without killing themselves, there will be no incentive for the best and the brightest to go into primary care."  —Michael Brennan

I know how we got here.  I wonder if we can undo the worst of it with the November elections???

Susan 

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

Not.

Even.

Close.

Booth!  I know you prefer the short form to the more nuanced view but stop and consider for a moment. To spend the amount of time, energy and brain power it takes to complete a medical education requires a dogged perseverance.  You need to be a top notch student to even make it into medical school.  If the goal were simply to "make money" there are other occupations that would probably be a surer fit with less effort.  To complete a medical residency is another long and grueling slog.  Do you know any doctors?  Have you ever discussed the process with a med student???  Or a doctor? 

Then when it's all said and done and you begin a practice, more start-up costs not the least of which is the high malpractice insurance rates especially for some specialty practices.  

 I'm always curious about the work that people do.  What they studied in college.  What they wanted to be when they started their education.  And how things change over time.  What I usually find with doctors more than any other profession is that they made the decision as a child.  Sometimes it was because of a family medical condition.  Gratitude that came with a cure or some palliative measures from a medical practitioner.  That sense of gratitude from the family of a patient and from patients is a major part of the perks of a doctor's job though. 

I once had a discussion with the fantastic cardiovascular surgeon from the even more fantastic world renowned one of a kind Cleveland Clinic where my father's life was twice extended through heart surgery.  We talked about the work he does and how it is both humbling and invigorating to be able to give a renewed life to a patient who would otherwise wither and die.  The balance required to recognize the surgeon is the facilitator but that much can also go wrong and those things are often beyond your control.  The grief at losing a patient.  The joy at seeing a healed patient walk the corridors after having his heart stop pumping while on the operating table for many hours. 

Anyway, you can Google and learn these things for yourself if you like.  Or you may smile and be content with the glib alone.  

I believe in a capitalist system and the doctors, in my view, are among the most deserving of compensation.  THEY DO SOMETHING OF VALUE.  Something that cannot be said for many of the employed in our populations.  If they are not compensated accordingly they will choose another profession rather than go through the hardships of the average of 11 to 17 years it takes to be trained in a specialty practice.  Not to mention the tediousness of filing government paperwork and the meager reimbursements received months and months later for Medicare or Medicaid patients, ever expanding with the new plan.  

Really.  You can't be suggesting mere altruism from this one segment of the working population, are you? 

Susan

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin