"DSK" wrote
Vito wrote:
That' odd. My brother, a mere Chiropractor, nets over $500,000/yr
working a
40 hour week. Do these MDs practise in the USA or ?

Yes. They work at state university medical centers or in rural counties.

That's comparing apples and oranges - top paid PhDs with bottom paid MDs. An
assistant prof in a rural college makes alot less than $125K/year too.

But even then the numbers don't compute. You correctly note that few MDs
work 40 hour weeks. The local *rural* MD charges $100 for a routine visit
lasting *maybe* 5 minutes. At twice that (10 min) per patient that's
$1,248,000/yr gross. Out of that he pays a nurse and a receptionist perhaps
the $48K and another $25K rent so even if he pays $150,000 for his
malpractiing peers misadventures he still nets $million/yr *IF* he actually
works just 40 hours a week.


BTW I don't know of a single MD who works 40 hour weeks. Most work 60+
hours a week, many work 90 hour weeks. Since the requirements for
resident work hours was chopped, somebody has to take up the slack. And
if one has research projects on the bench, then usually they work about
twice as many hours per week as their own residents.

That's a whole different problem demonstrating another flaw in a union
controlled system. We've all heard of unions that bankrupt employers or
drove them overseas with impossible demands. Well that is exactly what the
MDs' union (AMA) is doing to MDs - killing the golden goose by artificially
limiting the number of MDs.

BTW, would anybody here choose to see an MD who gets only 4-5 hours sleep a
night? Maybe that's why malpractice rates are high.

Medical care in this country is headed for a train wreck, and it's being
speeded up by people who insist it's the fault of those damn rich
doctors. If you think doctors are the problem, next time you're sick
just cut out the middleman... go straight to a lawyer.

You're right! It isn't the MDs per se. It is their union - the AMA - and
prescription drug laws. Get rid of them and the problem largely goes away.
All it takes is 3 calls from the Oval Office. 1. Hello AG? I want the AMA
investigated and prosecuted with the same vigor as Martha Stewart. 2. Hello
Mr Speaker, let get rid of those laws prohibiting Americans from buying
medicines overseas. 3. Hi Mr Secretary - I want you to have FDA remove all
*Non-narcotic* drugs from the prescription drug list. No, regulate them for
purity and all just let them be sold without prescription. Thanks. And
BINGO.

Not really. If you need cheap AIDS medication then I guess the answer is
to move to Africa.

No (Duh-uh) the answer is to buy your drugs from Africa without moving there
(You have heard of mail haven't you?) but GWB won't allow that so only very
rich US victims get to survive.

..... Price goes up, numbers of people who buy goes down...

YES! Because people who can't afford the higher price DIE. We're not
talking about frozen pork bellies, remember.

..... The problem here is that people continue to buy drugs they "can't
afford" and then complain. If you don't put your money where your mouth
is, the market system will whipsaw you 8 days a week.

Time for your medicine again old boy, you've beome incoherent.

Look back in history and see if you can find a time period when medical
care and drugs were cheap.

Easily - before there was an AMA.

....... You'd (and 99% of everybody else) would do to the drug
companies the same thing that everybody has done to the airlines...
demand the cheapest & shoddiest possible service at the lowest possible
price, with the result that half the drugs on the market would be
placebos. The pharmaceutical industry would be Wal-Mart-ized... do you
think that's a *good* idea??!?

Has anybody even vaguely mentioned disestablishing FDA? No! Then whatever
are you having this hissy fit about? Quick! Your Ritilan! (Gawd, I'd heard
about the bad LSD floating around 'nam but never thot it's still be causing
dilusions).

Next subject... bank deregulation...

Naw, Republicans deregulated the S&Ls back when Reagan was in remember,
allowing the anti-smut darlings or the religious right to steal peoples'
retirement savings. Even Hillary got in on it! Cost every man woman and
child in the USA over $5000 apiece. Not even Bush is that stupid .... err
.... is he?????