Talk about stuck on stupid. Physicians over at the American Medical Association (AMA) have teamed up with the big-government geezers over at AARP “to support congressional action to stop the next two years of Medicare cuts to doctors and provide for at least two years of positive updates.”
Here’s the thing: Medicare is a government program which has the power to tell doctors how much they’re going to pay them to treat patients in the system - and the doctors can’t do a damn thing about it.
The government payments are set artificially with no regard to market considerations. It doesn’t matter if one doctor’s overhead is higher than another doctor’s - or if one doctor got a better education and training than the affirmative action doctor down the street. The government pays what the government says its going to pay…period.
And quite frequently, the doctor actually takes a financial loss treating Medicare patients at the government rate. Which is why many doctors simply no longer take Medicare patients.
But the stupid part here isn’t that the left-leaning AMA is teaming up with the left-leaning AARP to try to get the government to pay them more for their services in the Medicare system.
The stupid part is that the same organization is supporting the Democrats’ expansion of the SCHIP health insurance program which will move even more of their patients from private health insurance programs into a government-run health insurance program which will control how much the doctors can charge for their services.
This just proves the old adage that being intelligent doesn’t make you smart.
Posted on October 9th, 2007 by Chuck Muth
Filed under: National
My brother in law is a physican.. he’s been complaining for years!
Nothing like not mincing any words!