Quote:
Originally Posted by Stormer
So you are even against physicians owning their own offices and clinics within the public system? They should all be Government employees and only work out of Government facilities?
|
Not necessarily. Depends on the ownership model. If its a sole proprietorship or coop, I have no problem with it because its directly owned by the workers (in this case, the doctors), or if its a non-profit of course, which would be ideal. If its a corporation, absolutely not, because of the profit incentives that come with it. The distinction is quite simple. Doctors currently charge a per patient fee, which isn't good for many reasons (not part of this conversation but a better payment system is possible), but those fees go to the doctor to pay for admin costs, rent/mortgage, other bills, and the rest is kept by the doctor. Once you add on a profit incentive from shareholders, either the payments from the public have to rise, or the costs have to be cut in order for the doctors to make the same, and more often than not, the cost comes out of quality of service. Yes, its well known that I am generally against the profit-motive, but healthcare, at the least, should not be driven by it, and we can get into the why if need be but my link to the tweet in my previous post summarizes it. Basically, outside of any supposed gains from innovation and efficiencies, they are far out shadowed by the arguably-negative incentive to keep either prices increasing or number of customers increasing in order to keep up the demand for profit growth from shareholders in a highly competitive stock market. Why do you think Americans are so unhealthy (and we aren't far behind)? Healthy people don't make good customers for for-profit healthcare (I will just add that Americans spend double per capita on healthcare than we do, for similar or worse outcomes). There is no reason for these services to not be provided by the public system other than ideology and the desire to keep the public service from expanding. Also, an aging population presents an immense opportunity for profit growth, as it already is for pharmaceutical companies and long term care facilities.