Quote:
Originally Posted by jeff4598
With the rapid corporatization of medicine we are becoming employees and the salaries will just go down and down. I would not go in to this field expecting to EVER be able to drive an M3. In most parts of the world docs are MIDDLE class and make the equivalent of $60-100,000 per year- America will be there when you are done with your training IMO. I am a psychiatrist. When I started practice in 1989, Medicare allowed up to $129 for a 45 minute office visit. Now it is ~$103 and there is a 23% cut being held over our heads. And this is just the start of the aging of the baby boom- it is clear that they expect us to care for twice as many people for the same total $. Since I am self employed I pay double payroll taxes and $4,500 dollars per MONTH for my family's health insurance. Do the math.
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THIS is the truth. I was involved with a patient-physician alliance to try to fight the illegal corporate takeover, but it died due to lack of interest by patients. No one seems to care that their hospital is "hiring" doctors merely to force self-referrals so that they can continue to charge 10-20 times what other providers charge for the same services.
The government is not only allowing, but is encouraging these takeovers because large corporations have more complex information systems. The government is interested in having unrestricted access to patient information and big groups with big electronic health records fit the bill the best. Unfortunately, allowing corporations to take over medicine will just lead to lower pay for the "providers" and higher costs for the "consumers".
I graduated in '93 and am still paying off loans. I have received cuts to reimbursement EVERY year since, with most insurers asking for at least 20% cuts this year. Somehow my rent ALWAYS increases as do staff costs-and this will be driven up even more with the current push to increase "minimum wage to get people out of poverty". If the guy flipping burgers at McDonald's who didn't finish middle school gets $9 and hour, imagine what the receptionist/medical assistants will want (already paying over $15 and hour starting for the least skilled jobs in the office).
Don't worry about those who say that your judgement is questionable. ANYONE who goes into medical school at this time has very questionable judgement. You'll be fine-as long as you go in assuming that you'll work harder every year and make less for doing so.
To those who state that any MD makes far more than their "$150k", that only applies for certain specialties these days. Primary care/psychiatry will be lucky to hit the "average" salary around $120k. This is inflated by those who overcharge for the 5 minutes they spend, billing as if they spent 30 minutes on a "complex" case. Don't assume that medical school will translate to hundreds of thousands of dollars unless you go into spine surgery or something similar.