[danielna]

When I hear about the overinflated cost of medicine I can't help but think of ties to the overinflated cost of education. While I believe in paying specialized, skilled laborers a rate commensurate with the value they provide, pretty much every med school grad I've ever known (specialized or not) shrugs at the notion of graduating with upwards of $250k+ in debt like it's this inescapable force of nature. They know how the system works, and they'll make it up soon. But therein lies the problem, as the costs of that $250k loan are already baked into inflated salaries across the board.

If there's a financial disincentive (aside from just greed) to drive down costs of care because you're looking at so much debt right out of the gate, it doesn't set much of a precedent to look for cheaper alternatives.

[jbooth]

State schools are relatively cheap, community college is really cheap, and public high school is free. If you can prove a need, you can go to your state's top state school for borderline free (I have a friend who was paid $100/semester to go to umass).

There's no real equivalent to any of those in medicine -- if I have a problem and don't have employer-provided insurance, I'm bankrupt, period.

[amalag]

Add to that a government assisted monopoly on "medicine"