[Tiberius]

Originally Posted by CDB

That's nice. Please show the me the Ultimate God Calculation method you used to determine the appropriate amount of dermatologists so you could imply that's too many. Especially since given the wait time there's obviously not enough to meet current demand.

The wait time is artificial. I've seen their appointment books in person and they only go about a week ahead. Mostly its open. They just don't want to cater to anyone other than those they are sure will pay them well. They can't legally just say "no we won't take you, we don't think you'll pay." So instead they just give the person a ridiculous wait time. Most don't want to wait that long because it is nearly always quite literally pointless. I'd also like to note, the waiting room is empty any time I've gone to any of these offices.

If you have a bacterial infection for example, it's probably going to be gone well beofre the 3 months is up. If it was an allergic reaction it will also have gone before then unless you are getting repeated exposure. The people that DO show up are people with stuff like skin cancer, chronic acne, or other longterm skin problems. And frequently for those unless you offer to pay cash, once again they delay you only for longer. To **** with them I just recently called up an office today to set up an appointment to have the doc "take a look at my skin cancer." next available appointment they said was 6 months from now. Told them forget it. I called back 10 minutes later and said I wanted laser hair removal, they said they had an opening this evening. I asked if the weekend was possible they said "after 11AM or 2PM Saturday".

They don't have a shortage. They are just telling patients to **** off unless they pay cash up front.

[spunkles182]

[quote=Tiberius;902569]

f you have a bacterial infection for example, it's probably going to be gone well beofre the 3 months is up.

what 3 months? i had a bactierial infection last month. I called to make an appointment at 7:30am and got in at 9:30am the same day.

To **** with them I just recently called up an office today to set up an appointment to have the doc "take a look at my skin cancer." next available appointment they said was 6 months from now. Told them forget it. I called back 10 minutes later and said I wanted laser hair removal, they said they had an opening this evening. I asked if the weekend was possible they said "after 11AM or 2PM Saturday".

and i just did a little thing called research and in your state you dont have to be physician to do the hair removal proceedure. A RN or even LPN can perform the proceedure.

and why would you call a doctors office to mess with them.
If you seriously did that (which i dont believe for a second you did), then you seriously need to get a life.

[CDB]

Originally Posted by Tiberius

The wait time is artificial.

Not the point. The wait time is what they can and do command from people because enough people want their services to deal with it. Whether it's from a genuine back log of patients or from the fact that they just don't want to deal with the workload the reason is the same: not enough doctors. You can bet your ass as more came on the scene and started competing for the business in the area all of a sudden the wait would decrease and/or disappear. But, because there's a glut of patients relative to doctors the doctors have the upper hand and can pick and choose how and with whom to do business.

There's an analog in another industry: housing. When rent control is enacted there follows almost immediatly a housing shortage. Land lords have long lines of people looking for housing, and so they can pick and choose who they want to let in, make people meet ridiculous standards for entry, be real strict with lease agreements and what not. In other words the total cost of housing, not just the monetary cost, goes up.

A nice case study of this phenomena happened in Jersey were one half of the state, the southern half I believe, discontinued rent controls. All of sudden land lords weren't too strict about pet rules, they were advertising, they were being nice to potential tenants, discriminating less, not making people wait, etc. When there's a shortage and a line of people looking for their service they can do whatever they want. Much like your doctors. If there were more of them, they'd have to start trimming their wait periods because there wouldn't be a line of people looking for them anymore. Just as without rent controls a person looking for housing from Landlord A could just look to Landlord B, C, D, E, or F if A was a prick, so could people go to Doctors B, C, D, E, or F if A's wait was too long.

That's not theory, that's how it works in 'the real world' you're so find of, which is why I mention the case study of Jersey as an example. I think the economist who wrote that one up was Walter Block, or he's at least referenced the work before so it should be enough to look it up if you want to research the issue yourself to see if it's really true.