nothing comes close to multiple years of 100 plus hour work weeks during training with the most intense demands – e.g. awake for 30 hours – working the ICU – on the bubble again (next in line for admission responsibilities) and you haven’t finished putting the lines in for the 250 pound alcoholic varix patient who’s bleeding to death in front of you while the family cries not so quietly outside the door…

compare that to being in a quiet law library counting the hours that you will bill your client

Nate, you only illustrate your ignorance about the law with this type of post. First, if you’re a plaintiff’s lawyer, you don’t charge anything – you only get paid if you win. Second, no one is debating the difficulty of med school. What I’m talking about is determining malpractice based on a newspaper article, or reviewing the actual facts. You tell me which is better.

“More money for lawyers at every level.”

Do you think if we eliminate med mal, we won’t need judges? Who will hear doctors’ complaints when they sue their insurers? Now you’re just being silly. You hate lawyers, but do you ever think about who you will turn to if you are injured? How about if you get divorced? How about if your employer screws you out of your pay? Or if someone breaches a contract with you?

Other jobs where lives hang in the balance? Lawyer for one. Police officer, numerous types of scientists, OSHA inspector, structural engineer. That’s off the top of my head.

At this point, you’re reading what you want to, not what I wrote, but that’s OK.

As for immunity, while that’s hyperbole, it’s to an extent what you’re asking for. If your mechanic told you that you weren’t smart enough to understand a faulty brake job (and I would imagine most of us have no idea how our car gets fixed), and he should only be judged by other mechanics, and even then he deserved a screening panel before the case got to trial and a cap on what you could recover no matter how bad your family was hurt in the accident caused by those faulty brakes, what would you think he was after?

As for doctors becoming rare, how about we cross that bridge when we come to it, OK? And despite AMA hysteria, we’re not anywhere close. An average salary of $150,000 still attracts a lot of people, and will continue to.

And med schools is all a big freakin’ party. Besides, you charge how much per hour for that research? Now who’s a overpaid whiner?

What’s more, there are appellate courts to review that decision if necessary. Maybe it’s just the libertarian, power to the people, streak in me.

And more money for the lawyers at every level.

The question is simple. How much would it take for physicians to quit whining? Everything has a risk/reward component. Physicians are bitching about the risk. How much would it take to quit bitching.

Well, they do go through years of med school, then comes the residency, then work 65 hours a week, then are on call … Im sure there a re plenty of other jobs taht are just as demanding where lives hang in the balance. Id like you to try to name one.

You’d think being the highest paid profession by far would do it, but evidently not. So that’s why I asked. I have no qualms with how much physicians make.

Well … in the first sentence it sounds like you do, then you deny what you just said …

They do a demanding job and deserved to be paid well for it. I just don’t believe they ought to have immunity as a result, though.

Who said anything about immunity? What do you mean by immunity? Are you thinking of diplomats?

So far, only one person has had the guts to answer my question, though.

That Michael Rack, MD, is pretty cool.

By the way, when ever anyone, including lawyers, goes on and on about how important and necessary they are, and whines about how victimized they are, I find humor in that.

Well, then let’s just let doctors become a rare community and tell tehm to shut up about being phased out of existence. That brings us back to the original point anyway.

I’m in favor of letting the people who have actually heard the evidence determine the value of the case. I know sitting through hours of testimony, examining medical records and such doesn’t have the same ease in at is reading a newspaper article about a trial and pronouncing judgment, but I still think that’s a pretty good way to go. What’s more, there are appellate courts to review that decision if necessary. Maybe it’s just the libertarian, power to the people, streak in me.

You inferred wrong. The question is simple. How much would it take for physicians to quit whining? Everything has a risk/reward component. Physicians are bitching about the risk. How much would it take to quit bitching. You’d think being the highest paid profession by far would do it, but evidently not. So that’s why I asked. I have no qualms with how much physicians make. They do a demanding job and deserved to be paid well for it. I just don’t believe they ought to have immunity as a result, though. So far, only one person has had the guts to answer my question, though.

Sorry that seemed obtuse. Although I think the fault lies in your willingness to ascribe views to me that I don’t hold.

By the way, when ever anyone, including lawyers, goes on and on about how important and necessary they are, and whines about how victimized they are, I find humor in that.

Curious.

You constantly rail against caps. How are you not in favor of large awards? Are we therefore to assume you are in favor of caps or some method of regulating large awards?

And you started this debate by saying,
Has there ever been a more highly paid profession that whined as much as physicians these last few years? How much more money do you need to make it worth doing?

From this I inferred you have a problem with the large compensations physicians get. Your other arguments seem to add to that view, particularly your crack about the God complex.

If I am in error, I could content the fault lies with you, not with me. I have only followed your words to their logical conclusion. If you don’t like that, I suggest you rethink what you really believe and try stating your views outright.

You’re wrong. The “average” lawyer in a major city will not make $125K their first year.
If you are in the top 5-10% of your class, you will make $110-125K as a starting associate at a very large defense/corporate firm. While you will occasionally get up as high as $140K salary in LA and NYC, $125K is normally the starting salary for the top of the class in a major city at a big firm. The vast majority will not see that for many years, if ever.

Who will you represent if you work for those firms? Major corporations, mostly.