Insurance / government repayment is mostly the same thing. A layer of bureaucracy.

But they have zero autonomy there too I assume?

Sample size of 1, but my gf blames forced overtime. Being legally obliged to stay for an 8 hours shift after finishing one has a way to drive you to depression.

I would pay more to go to a hospital where I know people are actually well rested. My last few hospital stays have been saturated with clearly agitated staff (doctors, nurses, reception) who were putting in minimal effort, and clearly didn't want to be there, and I can't blame them given the conditions that they're being forced to work under.

This is in the US, and I can't figure out why the Department of Labor hasn't cracked down on the medical industry yet. It's really horrific, especially because these are the people we're supposed to be relying on to keep us healthy and safe.

How hard is it to enforce 8 hour days 5 days a week? Every other industry has figured it out.

To be fair, most industries don't have evening and night shifts and a supply mismatch, most nurses want to work the day shift, it's harder to find candidates for evening and night.

At least at my local hospital, it's not just overtime -- regular shifts are 12 hours even when everything is normal. That's nuts.

That's a little bit different and not as detrimental though. It's actually an incentive for nurses because they get to work fewer days. Instead of doing 10 8 hours shift every two weeks they'll do 6 12 hours and basically get 8 days off every 2 weeks, which is pretty interesting from a free time perspective.

My gf did both and while she was tired after 12 hours, overall I think she preferred it.

Canada's solution will be to mass-import nurses from the third world who will do twice as much work for half as much money. Mark my words.

It's already happened with low-wage fast food jobs. Health care is next. Nurses and doctors will be replaced by poorly-trained third-world counterparts.

> Canada's solution will be to mass-import nurses from the third world

Yes that's basically what Quebec (and probably other provinces) is doing.

> Do twice as much work for half as much money

I might get tomatoes thrown at me for this, but anecdotally "third-world" nurses are usually not as good due to having experience on different equipment, drugs and often languages. It's better than having no one to cover the shift, but it can be seriously dangerous due to lack of training on specific protocols.

They get paid the exact same amount of money and are in the same union, so they absolutely don't do "twice as much work for half as much money".

I agree with your assessment regarding foreign trained nurses. I think it also applies to doctors as well.

Regarding the pay structure for nurses, over time the unions will be filled with mostly third-world ones, so I predict their bargaining position will be weakened and they will accept worse conditions.

Are they? Leaving to do what, exactly?

For every story of 'X leaves to do Y', there are a thousand people claiming they'll leave, that never do.

Instead, you're left with the diminished quality of care from people who desperately want to leave but they're only there because they can't afford to.

Some just leave to stay-at-home, some go back to school and a lot will take early retirement.