[zdragnar]

To clarify my point, the prices causing less than minimum wage income were for those procedures only. Other procedures paid more, but often not enough. On average, Medicare pays about 80% of what an insurance company will typically pay.

Try finding a doctor while on Medicare; depending on region and specialty, only 2/5 to 2/3 doctors will take patients on Medicare.

One other thing you may have missed: salaries are for doctors working at hospitals or clinics. Doctors working at private practices typically are self employed (or co-operate as a partner) and so are much more directly impacted by low payment rates.

Edit: it is worth pointing out that the requirements to become a doctor are pretty extreme. You first need a 4 year bachelor's degree, then need to go to medical school (costing a total anywhere from 150k to 400k on the extreme high end), followed by residency (basically, a paid internship at a salary lower than a full doctor) lasting 3-7 years.

[bmarquez]

> Try finding a doctor while on Medicare; depending on region and specialty, only 2/5 to 2/3 doctors will take patients on Medicare.

One thing that I've noticed is that there are private practice doctors that will take Medicare/Medicaid but the wait time for an appointment is longer compared to private insurance. It's like they decided to space out the less-profitable patients to maintain their margins. (I knew a few people who had the same primary care physician but different insurances.)