We need more kids wanting to grow up to be doctors and less wanting to be lawyers.
As a practicing lawyer for the last 25 years I follow the trends pretty closely. Law school enrollment is down nearly 40% in most states. There just isn't enough work any longer to sustain prior levels of enrollment. Of the roughly 215 law schools in this country we would do well to close at least half of those. It cost a lot and isn't worth it to the great majority of new lawyers.
We need more people going into the health care field. That's a given.
Law School applications are dropping because of the prohibitive cost of education. Med Schools are seeing some other interesting trends. Jewish kids are not running to Med school or Law School like they once did. They don't see the return on the considerable investment. More are going into finance. Huge increase in the number of Indian, Pakistani, Iranian, and Chinese kids going to Med school. They have the grades and aren't worried about the market.
There are plenty of MD's. Schools are turning them out. There just isn't a wealth of them in small towns and rural areas. They can't make a go of it very easily. Why not? You can't run a small office on Medicare, Medicaid reimbursement. They only payout about 80% of the cost of providing the service. Have you not noticed that the MDs have grouped up? That is out of necessity for 2 reasons. First is to cut operating expenses by sharing a facility. Second is have some bargaining power to negotiate fees with insurance companies. They partner up with Well Star or whom ever to have some leverage to negotiate rates. Ones without that leverage get the lowest reimbursement rate. If they don't take it, the ins companies tell them to stuff it. They don't care if they lose 1 doctor, but they do care what a whole citywide network might do if they get shut out.
Making more MDs is not going to send them out to small towns and rural areas. Especially not the Indian, Paki, Chinese kids. Dr. Wang, born in China and raised in L.A. probably will have a little difficulty fitting in living in Baldwin County Alabama. He may not even speak the same language. I know I don't! He probably won't understand why they run deer with dogs and tramp through the swap with lights on there heads drinking beer and hunting raccoons. One look at that lifestyle, and Dr. Wang is likely to go to Birmingham, or better yet, Escondido, California.
