[ClumsyPilot]

In the same vein, British nurses are going on strike now over pay and understaffing. In UK government sets their salary, so this is like all nurses going on strike - what do you do if you need to gove birth? There will be bodies.

The thing I don't understand - allegedly coservative government is capitalist to the core. So they can't hire enough nurses. Are they going to increase pay to hire more nurses? No. Capitalism for me but not for thee.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-63561305

[black_puppydog]

> what do you do if you need to gove birth? There will be bodies.

Every time I've seen medical strikes, workers organize emergency crews who stay behind to avoid exactly that. People choose medical professions to help others, and especially nurses typically do so despite the working conditions.

[TheCapn]

>especially nurses typically do so despite the working conditions.

This mentality is what's being exploited. And nurses are getting fed up.

They want to help people. But so much of the decision making is taking that away from them. Even the simple shit like bathing patients is being rushed or removed from them because they're too busy. Simple things like brushing a person's hair helps humanize them. At a certain point they're so overworked with terrible ratios that they can see all the inevitable near miss scenarios that have almost caused harm to patients or themselves/coworkers and without any support from the system to correct these issues they're giving up.

Again, they want to help, but they also can't repeatedly stand back and watch the train wreck in action. Many of them are saving themselves and exiting the profession because the mental and emotional toll they pay each shift is becoming too much.

My wife is an ICU nurse. Most of what I've said here comes from her, or her colleagues who I talk with.

[pmoriarty]

"This mentality is what's being exploited."

There was a BBC article about this recently, titled "The workers leaving their dream jobs"[1]:

"....workers have always hoped for roles that coincide with their interests and passions ... Yet this 'do what you love' narrative comes with drawbacks. Many people find that their dream jobs require more work, under worse conditions. Others discover that the industries they idolise trade on workers' passions to keep pay low..."

[1] - https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20221010-the-workers-le...

[saganus]

As someone very far from understanding what is going on, what is the rationale that governments are using to justify not increasing salaries/working conditions?

I know it's probably a variation of "there's no money", but, I would imagine nurse care to be something important for everyone.

I know I am being naive as I live in a country where the gov ia about to make significant cuts to health spending... but I always thought "first world" countries such as the UK would make saner choices in areas like this one.

[LorenPechtel]

Few people will suffer appreciably from the situation. Everyone will suffer from paying more taxes to fix the situation. Thus the voters will choose to underfund UHC systems. It's the inevitable result of having the same people in charge of spending and deciding if the standard of care is met. The solution that causes the least voter dissatisfaction is to lower the standards.

[ClumsyPilot]

> . The solution that causes the least voter dissatisfaction is to lower the standards

I believe there is no such consensus in UK, you are just trying to rationalise incompetent governance and ideology.

Last prime minister's best thoughts on Brexit was a 10 minute rant about cheese. Wether honest or corrupt, good or evil, how does a person of such modest ability come to top office? Trully the land of opportunity!

https://youtu.be/UFNRUuBARM4

[black_puppydog]

> This mentality is what's being exploited.

This is one of those things that I find schizophrenic about capitalism: the more you like your job, the less valuable (monetarily) your work becomes. Because, you know, you're being compensated in that warm fuzzy feeling when you do your work.

Except that this is insane! I can see the logic of the system ending up with that reasoning, but if that's the outcome then that system is stupid.

And also, turns out that fuzzy feelings don't feed a family.

And the fuzzy feeling crucially comes mostly when people are able to do their job well, not rushing it because the allocated minute to do it is running out.

[nivenkos]

And salaries in healthcare are far, far lower outside the US.

Like the UK and Europe pay absolute peanuts in comparison, just like in Tech, Law, etc. too.

[bitcharmer]

I'll take my $300k UK tech salary over $400k in the US and not go bankrupt over a medical bill or have my child shot at school, or get beaten to a pulp by a cop for trying to exercise my rights, thank you.

[PhasmaFelis]

It's depressing but not surprising that everyone in this subthread who said that strong social safety nets are worth a pay cut is getting downvoted. There's a strong thread of social Darwinism among HN readers.

[bitcharmer]

I think it may also be American exceptionalism at play. It shows in the time the downvotes appear on any comment that dares to point out some deep problems that US of A have been struggling with for quite a while.

But then, what can you expect from people indoctrinated from early childhood by, among many other things, being coerced to pledge to the flag every day like it's North Korea.

[thrwy_918]

Anecdotally it is much, much, much easier to get a $400k tech job in the US than a $300k tech job in the UK, so this isn't really a fair comparison

when I moved from a tech job in the UK to a tech job in the US, my salary more than doubled

[l3uwin]

95-140 is more correct.

And I'd still take it over the US.

[lupire]

Your $300k is extremely rare.

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

I make <$100k and I'd gladly make half what I do if I never had to worry about a medical bill ruining my life ever again.

[DontchaKnowit]

Your medical bill concern is valid- the others aren't really. The likelihood of being beaten by a cop or getting injured at school are probably about the same.

[rtkwe]

It's also much more expensive to become a doctor in the US though right?

[ajmurmann]

So how high are the relative salaries for nurses?

[chrisseaton]

> this is like all nurses going on strike - what do you do if you need to gove birth?

You see a midwife to give birth, not a nurse. I believe they’re also striking, but they’re not nurses and it’s an entirely different strike.

[Balgair]

Small point: Here in the US, midwife services can be great for uncomplicated and (mostly) unmedicated births. However, if you have any complications, you likely need to see an MD really really fast.

[chrisseaton]

Yeah most UK maternity wards are run by midwives, but there's an obstetrician on call (on site.)

[Balgair]

Thanks for the info! It's always fun to learn about the various medical differences between peoples.

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

Not really. My sister trained as a midwife and there are extremely few cases where an MD could have possibly done a better job than people who spent their entire careers studying pregnancy and birth.

She spent a lot of that time working with poor Amish communities, not the well-off people you probably imagine hire midwives in the US.

[hedora]

I don't see how this is possible. Hospitals can have multiple MD's on site in seconds, perform emergency C-sections, have large amounts of monitoring equipment, and so on.

I looked for some studies, but everything I found was based on poorly designed experiments and aren't worth linking to.

(e.g., excluding all complications after the fact shows similar fetal outcomes, but more cesarians for hospital births; failing to exclude non-credentialed midwives shows more fetal deaths for home birth. Duh?).

[Balgair]

It may depend on state, but I thought that c-sections are MDs only. Given that ~30% of all births in the US are via c-section, I wouldn't agree that such cases are rare.

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

If my sister is to be believed [0] C-sections are over-utilized by hospitals.

[0] I admit there is perhaps some bias here

[bee_rider]

This is a pretty widespread belief, right? Haven't looked into the actual underlying facts.

Looking at C-section rates:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/283123/cesarean-sections...

If I were a woman I'd probably rather live in some of those low C-section countries than the high ones. But this is "policy analysis by general country vibes," probably not very accurate, haha.

[socialismisok]

You've missed the actual question. Giving birth is just one example of many medically dangerous activities. You can replace with auto accident, stroke, whatever.

[triceratops]

In my experience, the midwife was hands-on only in the last hour or so of labor. Everything before that was the nurses.

[jjgreen]

There are several unions, the main ones being the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) and Unison. The former had always been the "no strike" union, they made that their selling point (when recruiting members). Up until this year, this is their first strike in England.

[Eleison23]

Well, since pregnancy is not a disease or disorder, I think that childbirth will be easily handled in routine ways by midwives. I look forward to fewer instances of induced labour and C-sections due to the obstetrician's tight golf schedule. Or fox-hunting or whatever British pastime gets in the way of collecting insurance monies.

[lost_tourist]

I think it follows from supply/demand that capitalism applies. If the nurses cut supply then demand goes up and eventually the consumer (government) has to pay more, unless they (government) introduce artificial (socialist regulatory authority) to make the strike illegal.

[ClumsyPilot]

> socialist regulatory authority to make the strike illegal

So the US government of 1920's was socialist, is that why they ordered the military to carpet bomb striking miners?

> Going on strike could—and often did—mean being beaten by strikebreakers, being shot at by National Guardsmen, or even having bombs dropped on you from biplanes.

https://listverse.com/2017/09/14/10-tragic-times-the-us-gove...

The word socialist has meaning, it doesn't mean 'bad guys'. It means siding with workers in their dispute with capital.

There can be times when it's the wrong this to do, but claiming that strike-breaking is socialist is like claiming that French Revolution was monarchist

[socialismisok]

Heads up, not all price controls are socialist. You can have price controls that serve capitalists goals. They might make it less of a free market, but that doesn't make it socialist. (Capitalism v socialism is not a binary distinction.)

[zajio1am]

> Are they going to increase pay to hire more nurses? No. Capitalism for me but not for thee.

UK has public healthcare. The primary mechanism how public healthcare keeps costs low is to use its monopsonistic market power to keep prices (including wages) as low as possible.

[pjc50]

As they're capitalists, their intent is to destroy the public health service and make it "not their problem", making people find private health cover (which has its own, often higher, pay deals for staff). Or else.

[lupire]

> often higher, pay deals for staff

Nope. See the OP.

[formerkrogemp]

Three cheers for Tory misrule and Brexit.

[gruez]

> Are they going to increase pay to hire more nurses? No. Capitalism for me but not for thee.

Regardless of whether you think the nurses deserve the pay raise, I have a hard time understanding why you’d think that squeezing suppliers isn’t part of capitalism. For instance, I doubt people would call Apple anti capitalist for refusing to accept TSMC’s price hikes.

[madamelic]

> I have a hard time understanding why you’d think that squeezing suppliers isn’t part of capitalism.

I have a hard time understanding why healthcare should be capitalistic and have a capitalist class who profit from simply owning healthcare facilities.

[gruez]

I'm not trying to argue whether it ought to be capitalistic or not. Just that the parent poster's assertion that it was contradictory with capitalism, or there was some sort of capitalism double standard doesn't hold water.

[madamelic]

Fair.

[madamelic]

> Capitalism for me but not for thee.

Same with bailouts.

"Oh, you don't have enough money to survive 6 to 12 months without income / did something dumb... wow, that really sucks. Well... bye."