Certainly, the medical industry does not face the same competitive pressure from outside, but that is the nature of industry in general.
Rather than calling medicine a monopoly, it is more accurate to accuse heal care providers and practitioners of colluding to ensure prices are high. Monopolies by definition cannot collude since there would be nobody to collude with.
In the grand scheme of things, I believe medical costs are accurately priced and it is people's wages that are not adjusting correctly.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2007/09/a_spoonf...
Not so, as the number of medical residents is de facto set by Congress (due to how the funding system works), thereby limiting the number of doctors in each specialty.
The critical difference is that there's no limit on the number of people who can get standard driver's licenses, but there is on medical licenses.
It's not just the AMA directly, though. Residencies are funded federally, I believe. I'm pretty sure the numbers per specialty are centrally controlled, but I'm not certain how the process works. And I don't know who limits the medical school slots, but I'm under the impression medical schools can't just increase the number of students at will.
All that being said, keeping the supply artificially low probably has some benefits.
...if drivers got to set the test standard and pass rate.
But I'm not sure opening up the gates is exactly what we want either. There are countless examples of charlatans trying to push the line here, and as a consumer, it would be too difficult, especially while fighting a serious disease, to tell who can really help me and who just wants my money.
There are better ways to make healthcare more affordable and more effective than to throw away the idea of proper certification.
For instance, some states (like the one in which I live) have granted more powers to nurse practitioners. I support this move.
There's even a big sign at the doctors office that says "only one health issue per appointment". Why? So they can scam the system for more cash.
Do you have any experience with the US medical system? I lived in Alberta for 7 years and in Quebec for 3 (important to note because it is hard to take you seriously since you did not even mention that healthcare is provincially administered in Canada).
> I have to book one appt to get referred for a blood test, another to take the blood, and then another appt to get the results!
Here is an alternative explanation to "doctors are incompetent scammers": you need a referral for a specialist so that specialists are not overwhelmed with requests from hypochondriacs who read something on the Internet. Once the test results come back the doctor wants to see you to explain the results and recommend further treatment. That saves everyone time and money and is the opposite of "scam[ming] the system for more cash."
The "one health issue per appointment" is not a government policy, it is a policy that some physicians have so that they can see more patients each day.
Great use of logic.
I still do not understand why you are blaming the general practitioner clinic for referring you to a specialist. If you want same-day STD testing there are a lot of private test centers in Canada. For example, top Google search result: https://www.stdcheck.com/canada/
That's been available here/US and it has come in handy.
If you look at the average earnings, Canadian physicians make ~320K gross salary [1], but they need to pay expenses out of that (reception staff, office, etc.). They do well, but they are not in strata of hedge fund managers.
We should probably just pay them a flat rate, but on the balance the Canadian system is much more cost effective than the US free market system.
[1] http://globalnews.ca/news/2898641/how-much-is-your-doctor-ma...
I guess doctors don't believe in the free market.
https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/medical-mo...