Why are doctors so well paid in the US?

[Vlad]

The overall highest paying profession in the United States is that of physician. [7] Physician (M.D.and D.O.) compensation ranks as the highest median annual earnings of any profession. Median annual earnings ranged from $156,010 for family physicians to $321,686 for anesthesiologists. Surgeons post a median annual income of $282,504.[16] By comparison the median annual salary for a Chief Executive Officer (C.E.O.) in May 2004 was $140,350.[17] Overall annual earnings among the nation's top 25 professions ranged from the $70,000s to the $300,000s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-figure_income

Is it because there is a shortage of this kind of professionals? Or because Medical School is hardly affordable for most students?

 

[Eldios]

I would say that the main reason is because the USA does not socialize medicine so they have a lot more freedom to see how many patients they like and to charge as much as they please (well as much as the insurance company will let them at least).

 

[Rade K]

You dont honestly think that doctors spend all that time and money in school because they want to help people do you?


Doctoring is a lucrative enterprise - it is like insurance, you need it! Why shouldnt they get paid that much.

 

[LoneSage]

The doctors in hospitals work their asses off, I'll say that much.

 

[Rade K]

I once read an article in Details magazine where doctors described techniques in staying awake. One of them involved masturbating to the brink of ejaculation and then stopping.

 

[norton9478]

They need to make that much to pay off thier malpractice insurance premiums...

Tort reform will solve all these issues.

 

[soulthug]

Why are football players so well paid?

Lolsy, don't get jealous kiddo.

 

[FormlessOne]

Thanks thuggles, stole the words out of my mouth.

 

[Lovergoat]

Could it perhaps be because there are so many fat and unhealthy Americans? Who became fat and unhealthy as a result of abundance and good insurance?

It's a self perpetuating thing. Doctors work hard(as has already been said).

Why shouldn't they make lots of money when said fat unhealthy people want to live forever, eat shite and get away with it?

I say good work American doctor types, don't bust your asses and remember.... A large patient with a fleece to be fleeced has a large fleece so enjoy the fruits of your labor.

 

[OrochiEddie]

terrible thread.

 

[LoneSage]

because they are the stars of a multi-billion dollar business, and without them it would be nothing.

same thing with movie stars or whatever. I read a few years ago in the newspaper that some local guy who played a bit part in an incredibly obscure movie back in the 70s gets paid like $6 a month because of it. It's crazy.

 

[BIG BEAR]

The Emergency Room Doctors deserve whatever they command for all they have to go through. Reputation means alot right now in the field but if medicine becomes socialized where salaries are capped regardless of experience and rep,look out!
BB

 

[SSS]

maybe because learning to stitch together nerve endings, muscle, blood vessels etc.. isn't something any average jack off can learn at a 6 month course from devry.

 

[aria]

I would say that the main reason is because the USA does not socialize medicine so they have a lot more freedom to see how many patients they like and to charge as much as they please (well as much as the insurance company will let them at least).

Good guess, but HMOs actually made US doctors paid far less than they used to --a lot of those damned things ate up connections with health care plans and have allowed them to press down on money allocated to doctors and hospitals (creating an entirely new group and diverting 30% of the money that went to the other two in the late-80s/early-90s).

It used to be a specialist could make millions a year without as much trouble, it's a lot tougher out there... for a pimp.

Still, Vlad, it's a pretty easy way to make 6-figures. There are certainly others. Get great grades in law school and you'll be making more money faster (doctors take years to ramp up to six-figures with their residency and such), but working just as hard or harder --esp. in certain markets.

Honestly, the doctors I know who thought the socialized health care movement that failed in the '90s was a bad thing mostly think that the rise of the HMOs that came in its place to be even worse than they imagined.

 

[aria]

The biggest myth is that doctors can't get rich in a universal health care system. They make a lot of money doing private medical work (its not as if a universal plan would replace all health care, it would just supply the bottom level), in capitalist countries with a socialized health care system the rich pay top doctors to get the best health care. The best doctors don't need to work for the state, the make a pretty penny helping those who can afford their work. That's my thought on an ideal system: everyone has health care (the over 45 million Americans who don't have jack), but there is a market for the best and brightest for those who want to get faster, more efficient service.

 

[IMTheWalrus]

The biggest myth is that doctors can't get rich in a universal health care system. They make a lot of money doing private medical work (its not as if a universal plan would replace all health care, it would just supply the bottom level), in capitalist countries with a socialized health care system the rich pay top doctors to get the best health care. The best doctors don't need to work for the state, the make a pretty penny helping those who can afford their work. That's my thought on an ideal system: everyone has health care (the over 45 million Americans who don't have jack), but there is a market for the best and brightest for those who want to get faster, more efficient service.

This is all true.

If we went on a socialized system, doctors would still make a ton of money. It's just that some of the obscenely rich doctors wouldn't have quite as much fuck you money as they do under our current broken system. It would not the disaster that the absolute free market conservatives think it would be.

The fact of the matter is that people can't afford health care anymore. Insurance rates are too high, less employers are providing it, and copays and deductibles are way up. The only people doing well under this system are insurers and drug companies. Even the doctors are being strained by the insurance companies who will mess with medical billing codes after they are submitted.

Also, someone mentioned that we shouldn't have to pay for fat slobs insurance, or something to that effect. Well, it's not just fat slobs who have health problems. Anybody could need an expensive emergency cancer operation, or an operation from an accident, or had a heart operation. How would you feel if your insurance company and the hospital left you $100K in debt from an operation you didn't even think you would need? That would destroy your life. It's my opinion that the finances can be so backbreaking that we need government intervention, before this system crushes all of us, because that's the path we are moving toward.

 

[BoriquaSNK]

I just saw Sicko and Michael Moore interviews a young British doctor who makes about 85,000 pounds just out of residency.

Poor guy, probably struggling to pay his bills.

 

[ki_atsushi]

I just saw Sicko and Michael Moore interviews a young British doctor who makes about 85,000 pounds just out of residency.

Poor guy, probably struggling to pay his bills.

In the UK 85,000 pounds/yr probably is struggling.

Look at all the taxes they have to pay (something like 18% sales tax, just for one example), not to mention the loans the guy had to take out to pay for school.

 

[aria]

In the UK 85,000 pounds/yr probably is struggling.

Look at all the taxes they have to pay (something like 18% sales tax, just for one example), not to mention the loans the guy had to take out to pay for school.

Well, at least he doesn't have to pay for health insurance

 

[BoriquaSNK]

In the UK 85,000 pounds/yr probably is struggling.

Look at all the taxes they have to pay (something like 18% sales tax, just for one example), not to mention the loans the guy had to take out to pay for school.

But do they pay income tax? I actually don't know, I'm curious.

If they don't then an 18% sales tax is nothing.

Well the salary is almost identical to the average of Americans coming out of residency, close to $150,000 a year.

And they get bonuses from the Govt based on how many people they get to lose weight and stop smoking, etc. How great would that be if doctor's got those kinds of incentives over here?

The guy bought a beautiful townhouse for around 500k pounds and drove an Audi A8...I think they're doing fine.

 

[Lastblade]

I don't mind doctors getting paid alot. By and large, they help/save people on a daily basis. But athletes getting paid millions and millions by putting a ball in a hole/over the park/end zone/net are retarded.

 

[norton9478]

I'd rather be a nurse than a doctor....

 

[IMTheWalrus]

I don't mind doctors getting paid alot. By and large, they help/save people on a daily basis. But athletes getting paid millions and millions by putting a ball in a hole/over the park/end zone/net are retarded.

Agreed, but unfortunately this is one of those things that people actually have to do something about if they want to change. If people are pissed that ballplayers are making millions, they need to stop paying hundreds of dollars on tickets and concessions at the games. That's where the salaries come from.

Regarding the UK doctor, he said himself that it was a system that rewards good behavior (getting people to quit smoking, lower cholesterol, etc.) and pays the doctors handsomely. The guy lives in a very expensive place in London, which is one of the most expensive places in the world to live, and he has no problems. He even drives an expensive Audi.

 

[evil wasabi]

I would say that the main reason is because the USA does not socialize medicine so they have a lot more freedom to see how many patients they like and to charge as much as they please (well as much as the insurance company will let them at least).

It just says that doctors are the highest paid profession in the US, not that doctors get paid the most in the US compared to other countries. As a matter of fact, a doctor in London works in a socialized health system and gets paid about the same as a doctor in many parts of the US. The difference is that the government pays the bill, not the

Doctors' salaries are also not standardized. A doctor in Oklahoma will be offered more money than the same doctor in New York. Why? Demand for good doctors is high in places that good doctors would rather not work in.


http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/08/29/050829fa_fact
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa532.pdf - counterpoint to the nwyorker article

 

[ki_atsushi]

I'd rather be a nurse than a doctor....

Agreed. A nurse practitioner can make tons of money wiithough having to take the extra years in school to become a doctor.