[BartSimpson]

A very well written essay from a doctor who is dealing with government mandates and facing the prospect of more government mandates...

http://www.aapsonline.org/index.php/sit ... letter=off

Quote:

By: Jane M. Orient, M.D.,

For many, “the 1%” are the “super-rich,” the “millionaires and billionaires” (as if it didn’t take 1,000 millionaires to equal a single billionaire). “Occupiers” think that “the 1%” have more money than people should be allowed to have, so our government should take some of it and distribute it to “the 99%.”

But this would not be enough to be sure that “the 99%” have everything they need, especially medical care. So let’s look at “the 1%” in a slightly different way: the 1% who have exceptional knowledge and skills, who could provide us with the medical care we need and presumably deserve.

Doctors are generally not in the 1% of the super-rich, despite what many people think. But regardless of their financial status, why should they be allowed to hoard their skills? After all, government (or “we all”) helped to pay for their education, or helped build the hospitals in which they work.

As one internet commenter recently asked me: “How does it help ME for you to be independent? My husband and I depend on Social Security and a military pension.”

Indeed, a physician’s independence doesn’t help the government’s wards, and might siphon some of “society’s” resources away from them.

When I stopped accepting money from Medicare, one of my patients told my receptionist, “I paid my taxes; she should have to prescribe my hormones.”

Many people seem to think that their needs trump the rights of others—at least of the specially “privileged” 1%—to their property or even their liberty.

We could engage in an argument about the effects of policy based on this logic. Suppose the government had told me, in 1970, that I could go to medical school, spend the prime of my youth studying like a demon, often working 36-hour or longer shifts, pay huge tuition fees, work for three years of residency at less than minimum wage—then be an indentured servant for the rest of my life.

As many talented young people are doing today, I might well have said “no thank you” and chosen a different career path. Or finding out too late, I might, like workers in socialist paradises, develop effective systems gaming or work avoidance strategies. Patients of course are not well served by doctors with a slave mentality. Slaves tend to be surly and nonproductive, focused on avoiding punishment rather than on doing the best job possible. They are not risk takers or innovators.

But let us not use the utilitarian argument that socialism doesn’t work. Let’s pretend that it does. Should we advocate such a system? Or reject it because it is morally wrong?

Most people these days seem to think that if they get a better job offer, they should be able to accept it. But what about “the 1%”? Suppose that a patient values a physician’s services and offers to pay more than Medicare allows? Better still, offers to pay up front without costly, frustrating busywork requirements? Should the physician be free to accept?

If that patient is enrolled in Medicare Part B, today’s answer is that it would be against the law, at least if the physician is not opted out of Medicare. Soon, as “reform” proceeds, it might be against the law for any physician to accept a better job offer.

This would mean that it would also be unlawful for a patient to receive a treatment that deviates from the uniform minimum. How could I treat “the 1%” of patients who are seriously sick better than the 99% who are healthy?

Socialism means that there is no unalienable right to life, liberty, or property. Some must be enslaved or sacrificed.

Freedom is morally right. Slavery is morally wrong—even if the new slaves belong to a group that is perceived to be “advantaged” or “privileged,” and the wards of the state who receive the conscripted services to be “disadvantaged” or “vulnerable”

Fortunately, freedom also brings prosperity and wonderful new medical treatments. But even if it didn’t, we would be morally obligated to choose it.

[sandorski]

This argument does not really help the cause. Just another, "I got mine, so fluff off!"

No Man/Woman is an island, we all rely on each other to some extent. If that makes us "Indentured", why does the mythical 1% think they can be separate from the equally mythical 99%?

The good Doctor feels entitled to a privilege by mere achievement. An achievement that could only ever be reality to a small few. It is a mindset that has existed in the past, especially within Europe, and the US was largely founded on avoiding that very thing. The good Doctor seems to aspire to Royalty.

That said, perhaps some of the people this Doctor sees on occasion have their own Faults/Misconceptions, but if the good Doctor thinks that she is above obligation, her opinion on the matter can only be described as, Ridiculous.

[andyt]

Even in Canada, we don't have the medicare jackbooted thugs forcing doctors to accept payment under the medical plan. They're free to only see patients privately. In fact some doctors do both. So I'm not sure what she's whining about?

[BartSimpson]

andyt wrote:

Even in Canada, we don't have the medicare jackbooted thugs forcing doctors to accept payment under the medical plan. They're free to only see patients privately. In fact some doctors do both. So I'm not sure what she's whining about?

Obamacare is starting to look pretty scary as it coalesces into reality. The so-called death panels Sarah Palin was ridiculed for mentioning are starting to look exactly like what Sarah said they were.

Townhall is a Democrat site and they are starting to side with the 'death panel' interpretation...

http://townhall.com/columnists/johncgoo ... ath_panels

The issue is that there is being created a web of regulations and laws that will effectively ration care and force doctors into participating in the health care scheme. We're even seeing some Congresscritters saying that parts of the law prohibit Americans from seeking care in other countries in order to avoid regulated care schemes (rationing).

And what the good doctor is saying is simple: If you limit what a doctor can be paid but you don't limit what they have to pay for their education, insurance, and overhead then the best and brightest people will not go into the profession.

So your 'right to healthcare' means what, exactly, when you have no one you can force to treat you?

[PublicAnimalNo9]

Quote:

After all, government (or “we all”) helped to pay for their education, or helped build the hospitals in which they work.

Greedy bitch. She has no problem with gov't helping to pay for HER education but the gov't better NOT pay for health care FOR the masses.

Quote:

Socialism means that there is no unalienable right to life, liberty, or property. Some must be enslaved or sacrificed.

Like those that "helped" to pay for her education, and now can't see her because she quit taking Medicare??

The only thing she basically said in this entire article is:
Socialized medical education is good.
Socialized medicine is bad.

[Proculation]

Quote:

Socialized medical education is good.
Socialized medicine is bad.

Which one do you want to privatize to remedy the situation ?

[andyt]

She made her choice, nobody is holding a gun to her head. And we and you do limit what she has to pay for her education - she didn't pay nearly the full cost of it.

Americans seeking treatment in other countries - you mean like socialized Canada, 'cause it's a lot cheaper here?

[xerxes]

So the health care reform passed by the Congress is slavery is it? What a garbage article.

[PublicAnimalNo9]

Proculation wrote:

Quote:

Socialized medical education is good.
Socialized medicine is bad.

Which one do you want to privatize to remedy the situation ?

Ummmm in the US where the article comes from? Seeing as how health care is already privatized down there...well, I think you get my drift.
Think about it Proc. The "good" doctor had her education funded in part with taxpayer dollars, yet wants nothing to do with Medicare, which is health care funded in part(or in full) by taxpayer dollars.
She then went on to rant about socialism limiting freedom while that same socialism helped pay for her education.
She might not be a 1%er financially, but she sure has the attitude that many attribute to 1%ers.