we are living in a world where a trucker today is offered less than
his fuel costs to deliver a load..  similar for many others, the
nation is is economic decline....can doctors retain their rates of
compensation (fully earned I grant that) as US engineers are out of
work or competing with russians and chinese at 2 dollars an hour?

well?

no they cannot.    and the govt coffers cant either... the entire mess
is headed south... the doctors among us in the end.

Phil scott

There are a number of emergency rooms where the doctors work on illegal
aliens and uninsured patients without pay.  Without pay for them. But the
doctors get paid.  We pay for both us and the poor.  Particularly the trauma
centers.  I could go into detail about the Baltimore Shock Trauma unit, but
why bother.  Reasonable people know about the situation.  We are all paying
a surcharge for the indigent.

The bottom line is that people who pay, pay for those who do not pay.  And
if you pay cash, then you pay much more than what an HMO can negotiate.
You'll pay ten dollars for a box of Kleenex.

My sixteen-year old son was directed by a so-called friend to drive his
stock car off the trailer, into the garage.  The so-called friend did not
tell my son that the dirt track race car, never driven by my son, had
limited brakes.  Also the so-called amigo (hereinafter called the idiot)
placed himself in front of the car while directing it, so it crashed into
him, pinning him against a freezer, breaking both legs.  He was ambulanced
to Parkland Hospital, in Dallas, Texas, the one trauma center that takes
uninsured, because, of course, the idiot had no medical.  Subsequently he
sued ME.  My insurance company said that he had more than 50%
responsibility, but that they would, like they always did, settle outside of
court, giving his extortionist lawyer his fee, while the idiot got a
pittance.  In my next Dallas County property tax bill they stated the amount
that was set aside for indigent care at Parkland Hospital, which I was to
pay.  So I pay for insurance, I pay property taxes,  and the indigent pay
nothing.  I paid. Since I was retired I even bought the idiot his lunch
every day.  I moved from Texas but it does not make any difference.  We are
all paying for the poor.  One way or the other, we are all paying the bills.
Even my church sends money to the poor.  Even to foreign countries that are
sending us their poor.  No one asks me.  I'm just expected to pay.  So are
you.