To all these people that say, “talk to your doctor about…”: how many people out there actually have a family doctor who they can call up and just have a chat with? I sure don’t. In 10 years, I’ve never found a doctor that wasn’t booked out for months and so busy that an assistant comes in the room to do most of the talking. You see the doctor for maybe 5 minutes and they’re so burned out they barely listen.
We’ve known about this doctor shortage for at least 10 years (even before the ACA) but do you know who’s to blame for this massive shortage of doctors? The American Medical Association working with the Federal Government at least as far back as the 1980s. After reports came out that “a glut of doctors” were on the way. You see, people figured out that being a doctor paid well, so greedy capitalists had entered the profession to provide a needed service and make some money. This would eventually bring down salaries so the number of graduates, residences, and licenses in any particular year were intentionally restricted to protect the established providers (who were, btw, largely white, affluent, and older; if you care about that).
So as we’re going through this situation and the mostly “progressive”, mostly middle- or upper-class, non-minority people (you know, the one’s who talk about all the injustice) are saying, “just talk to your doctor and you’ll make the right choice,” remember that it’s their progressive policies that f*ck’d the entire medical system in the first place. They’re the ones that have consistently made it harder to find an affordable doctor or a medical service that’s cheap and easy to find. The problem has never been the free market or personal choice. The problem is the government and it’s mandates that come along in the guise of protecting the public.