re: Trigger Warning: UMC nurses in NO vote to unionize

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Medical is so accessible that it’s ridiculous prices continue to rise for basic procedures.

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Yet, you are defending administrators, who not long ago did something that was actually very "communist" when they forced workers who mind you most had actual medical knowledge, into taking an experimental vaccine.

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They did that to stay in business, moron.

The Diaper Filler In Chief mandated that any place that accepts federal insurance reimbursement—that's Medicare, Medicaid, and federal Blue Cross Blue Shield—had to.

Again, y'all whiners need to whine at the right people. Stop voting for bullshite like that and then yelling at someone else when they have no choice but to react to it.

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They did that to stay in business, moron.

The Diaper Filler In Chief mandated that anyplace who accepts federal insurance reimbursement—that's Medicare, Medicaid, and federal Blue Cross Blue Shield—had to.

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When you've got nothing, resort to name calling with the "moron" bs

So the benevolent administrators were throwing their workers under the bus so they could keep money flowing in from a corrupt government you're telling me

Sounds like some workers in healthcare have legitimate reasons for banding together.

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If there is a shortage and they need them then the jobseeker should conceivably have the upper hand, right?

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You're assuming market forces?

Healthcare is not marketforce driven. Healthcare reimbursement is fixed.

Hospitals can hire fewer low quality RN temps at equal or higher pay, then flex them off prn, quality be damned. "Costs" (money not lives) are saved, and Admin bonuses escalate.

Problematically, med reimbursement is not quality based. If doctor's orders are for a patient to be turned Q 3hrs, and the Locum Filipino RN hiree ignores the order, often nothing happens ... except of course for the patient, who develops a decubitus ulcer ... which can be a painful death sentence. Meanwhile, patients still seek care at the facility because RN quality deficit is opaque, or poorly understood, until it's too late.

Until reimbursement is permanent-staff based, and RN ratio based, unionization is a reasonable interventional option.

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People think all hospital systems are rolling in money

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The discussion involves administrators who are running their system quality into the ground, not the systems themselves.

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Market forces do indeed drive healthcare expenses

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False.
Communized reimbursement undercuts that.

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if by "healthcare expenses" you mean the expenses of a company who provides healthcare services, such as a hospital. Labor, supply and demand, etc., they all impact the cost of doing business for those companies.

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If market forces were a driver, hospitals could not survive charging 200-250% for endoscopies identical to ones provided for the same patients in stand-alone OPT units. Hospitals could not survive similar overcharges for other OPT procedures.

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Specifically, those in less populated, more rural areas.

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If market forces were at play, those facilities could bill IAW their costs. They cannot.

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If there is a shortage and they need them then the jobseeker should conceivably have the upper hand, right?

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Yeah, except that depending on who you ask, the nursing shortage isn't a true shortage.

Hospitals routinely understaff these days and nurses end up getting the biggest shaft from that practice. Someone mentioned nurses making $90k+ earlier and he may be right, but I don't think pay is the biggest gripe—not from most locales, anyway (nursing compensation varies widely depending upon where we're talking about).

It's not the big gripe I hear from nurses, anyway. The big gripe I hear is that they need 20 nurses on a floor to do everything they are required to do, but the hospital only keeps 15 on staff.

So there are actually plenty of nurses available to do the jobs, but the hospitals don't hire enough and more and more nurses are getting fed up with being overworked and part of a team that is understaffed.

Notice that not once have I said on this thread that I don't think nurses have any legitimate gripes. They probably do.

But I think the practical reality of the situation prevents unions from being a true answer, and I think (know) that no matter how much the CEO of the hospital makes, it has no impact on nurses' salaries, etc.

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False.
Communized reimbursement undercuts that.

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Explain how. Because you're wrong.

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If market forces were a driver, hospitals could not survive charging 200-250% for endoscopies identical to ones provided for the same patients in stand-alone OPT units. Hospitals could not survive similar overcharges for other OPT procedures.

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The expense isn't what the hospital gets paid for the equipment. The expense is what it costs the hospital to buy it. I suspected you didn't actually read what I wrote and now I'm almost certain of it.

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If market forces were at play, those facilities could bill IAW their costs. They cannot.

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I said market forces are at play on the expense side. Their costs, as you say.

If you're going to insist that market forces do not dictate what hospitals pay for eggs, toilet paper, sheets, scalpels, labor, paper, computers, etc., you're going to have to talk about that. All you keep talking about is what they charge, not their expenses.

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Ochsner’s CEO makes more than $6 million a year.

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So does Ohtani

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Explain how. Because you're wrong.

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Well ... I have just a skosh of experience in the arena. I'll give benefit of doubt, and assume we're miscommunicating somehow.
But, no, I'm not wrong.

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I suspected you didn't actually read what I wrote and now I'm almost certain of it.

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Yes, I read it. Sort of a definitional thing, perhaps. I think of market as soup-to-nuts expense-profit transactional. Sans facility-reimbursement, I'd think of your "equipment" equation more as the vendor/manufacturer market, rather than that of the facility. Again, facility reimbursement is predetermined dependent on facility-type and ownership, rather than facility charge or equipment cost. In those terms, reimbursement has nothing to do with the equipment or utility in isolation. OTOH, each categorical-type facility is reimbursed identically for equipment usage, regardless of quality.

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If you're going to insist that market forces do not dictate what hospitals pay for eggs

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Silliness. FWIW, the hospital cafe CAN charge IAW what the market will bear.