Making a Killing in American Health Care, a Step-by-Step Guide (1)

It depends on what the definition of the word “is” is (2). This not a political post! The picture/quote is added as an attention getter. It really has nothing to do with the article. See, this article has been floating around social media for a short period of time lately. When I first glanced or should I say glossed over the title, I read it as ….”is killing American healthcare.” That elicited my attention, i.e. the words ‘killing’ and ‘American Health Care’ in the title. I wanted to read that article. What is killing American Health Care? All this brain chatter before actually reading the article. Then I opened the link and re-read the title. Oops: Making a killing in American Health Care (1). Then I experienced more brain chatter: Is making a killing ok in American Health Care? Who’s making a killing? Is there killing going on in American Health Care? Why are we talking about killing in American Health Care? What is the definition of the word ‘is’? 

Ok, I’m claiming jet lag on the preceding paragraph as I’m overseas visiting family right now. Seriously, the article is a pretty good and easy read. It has nothing to do with being a physician, or physician pay. It is merely an unofficially developed satirical step-by-step listing of how health care as a business is unfolding for profit. It’s more on maximizing profits and subsequent salaries for administrators and executives. Now it makes me think of those administrators and CEOs, and how people always bash physician’s and blame physician’s pay for the cost of health care, forgetting about the admin and CEOs salaries. They are the ones making a killing off the system that seems lopsided against physicians. Somehow society tends to blame the physician. Suffice to say, it is not the physician making the killing in American Health Care.

“But for patients and for taxpayers in New Jersey, and everywhere else in the United States, it is the practice of legalized price gouging, and of making a killing under a system that has been thoroughly warped and corrupted by government public policy and by the rampant corporatizing of medical care in this country.” 

The article also made me think of when I was on my 3rd year surgical rotation. I was talking to my attending physician about making the decision to become a physician as a middle age adult that it was not about the money. He was brutally honest and told me that it was ok to think about and be paid well after the years of sacrifice in education and training. We may not make a killing as a physician compared to admin/CEOs as the article purports, but:

Do you want to be the highly-paid CEO of a hospital/“health” system?

Then read on………….  

REFERENCES:

  1. https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/12/03/craig-m-wax-do-making-a-killing-in-american-healthcare-a-step-by-step-guide/ 
  2. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/1998/09/bill-clinton-and-the-meaning-of-is.html

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