Family Medicine in Alberta vs. Ontario - can someone provide info?

[medigeek]

With the NDP party in Ontario being a likely winner after Wynne giving up today, myself and others are very serious about moving (Alberta/Sask/Manitoba). Does anyone know how family med friendly Alberta is? My understanding is fee for service billings pay better, general income is higher, taxes are a bit lower and there are less restrictions overall. Although, Alberta does not have an equivalent to FHOs like in Ontario? 

In addition, how about inpatient or EM work? Need to be more rural to do it as an FM in ON, whereas I figured Alberta's shortage means you can be closer to the suburbs and do EM/inpatient. But I may be way off. 

And lastly, I believe there are fewer NPs in Alberta?

Thanks!

[robclem21]

Isn't Alberta also NDP government?

[la marzocco]

Also I think the polls are predicting a conservative majority.. 

[medigeek]

11 hours ago, robclem21 said:

Isn't Alberta also NDP government?

The two right wing parties merged. Won't ever happen again. 

[Coronaxtra]

On 6/2/2018 at 12:57 PM, medigeek said:

With the NDP party in Ontario being a likely winner after Wynne giving up today, myself and others are very serious about moving (Alberta/Sask/Manitoba). Does anyone know how family med friendly Alberta is? My understanding is fee for service billings pay better, general income is higher, taxes are a bit lower and there are less restrictions overall. Although, Alberta does not have an equivalent to FHOs like in Ontario? 

In addition, how about inpatient or EM work? Need to be more rural to do it as an FM in ON, whereas I figured Alberta's shortage means you can be closer to the suburbs and do EM/inpatient. But I may be way off. 

And lastly, I believe there are fewer NPs in Alberta?

Thanks!

Doug Ford will be the next premier based on the current polls. Sincerely hope NDP don't form government or combine with the liberals to form a coalition. That would be the worst 

[medigeek]

45 minutes ago, Coronaxtra said:

Doug Ford will be the next premier based on the current polls. Sincerely hope NDP don't form government or combine with the liberals to form a coalition. That would be the worst 

Polls can underestimate turnout and given how close it is + Wynne giving up = can easily have a NDP wave take over. 

I sincerely do not believe it's fair to our efforts pursuing medicine to have a left wing government in charge who thinks we should (morally) make less and pay more tax. 

[Coronaxtra]

1 hour ago, medigeek said:

Polls can underestimate turnout and given how close it is + Wynne giving up = can easily have a NDP wave take over. 

I sincerely do not believe it's fair to our efforts pursuing medicine to have a left wing government in charge who thinks we should (morally) make less and pay more tax. 

Hiking taxes, figuring out ways to pay for dental and pharm plans, don’t forget about making Ontario a sanctuary province. Where is all this money coming from? Oh yeah the doctors, dentists, etc who make too much money 

[medigeek]

9 minutes ago, Coronaxtra said:

Hiking taxes, figuring out ways to pay for dental and pharm plans, don’t forget about making Ontario a sanctuary province. Where is all this money coming from? Oh yeah the doctors, dentists, etc who make too much money 

That's just the beginning. These guys genuinely believe making more money is evil and everyone should be equal. They're mostly radical marxists who dream of a communist society. And we're going to give these guys power? No thank you. 

[heydere]

Not to create major disputes amongst us, but I personally think that physicians are over compensated for their work. Yes I do understand that we have years of debt, years of hard education and we make a difference in critical moments of people’s lives and hence should be rewarded. 

As a first generation physician and immigrant though, I have seen how incredibly difficult jobs people in other professions work and the relatively low incomes they earn. Most middle-income families would be lucky to afford a single international vacation in more than a decade. Meanwhile, all physicians afford multiple vacations per year. 

I understand it is hard to see a cut in your pay cheque but I think it’s important to be cognizant of others in the society.. We are so fortunate to earn what we do, to do what we do, but being so defensive about our incomes only makes us look worse in the eyes of the public. 

[GrouchoMarx]

14 minutes ago, heydere said:

Not to create major disputes amongst us, but I personally think that physicians are over compensated for their work. Yes I do understand that we have years of debt, years of hard education and we make a diffidence in critical moments of people’s lives and hence should be rewarded. 

As a first generation physician and immigrant though, I have seen how incredibly difficult people in other professions work and the relatively low incomes they earn. Most middle-income families would be lucky to afford a single international vacation in more than a decade. Meanwhile, all physicians afford multiple vacations per year. 

I understand it is hard to see a cut in your pay cheque but I think it’s impoftant to be cognizant of others in the society.. We are so fortunate to earn what we do, to do what we do, but being so defensive about our incomes only makes us look worse in the eyes of the public. 

 

the greed displayed by some specialties reflects poorly on the profession as a whole, which i think is hard to  dispute.  but i dont think that we should be paid less for our efforts. ones life is the most valuable thing anyone can have and our job is to make sure it is lived as healthily as possible. wouldnt you want the most intelligent and dedicated people to be attracted to a career of such personal weight? 

[medigeek]

20 minutes ago, heydere said:

Not to create major disputes amongst us, but I personally think that physicians are over compensated for their work. Yes I do understand that we have years of debt, years of hard education and we make a difference in critical moments of people’s lives and hence should be rewarded. 

As a first generation physician and immigrant though, I have seen how incredibly difficult jobs people in other professions work and the relatively low incomes they earn. Most middle-income families would be lucky to afford a single international vacation in more than a decade. Meanwhile, all physicians afford multiple vacations per year. 

I understand it is hard to see a cut in your pay cheque but I think it’s important to be cognizant of others in the society.. We are so fortunate to earn what we do, to do what we do, but being so defensive about our incomes only makes us look worse in the eyes of the public. 

Feel free to donate your money away  

When a nurse practitioner/PA can earn 6 figures, doctors should be making triple that at minimum for the same hours of work. When you invest this much time, effort, money and provide a high stress/high liability service with no employment benefits/insurance/paid vacation and deal with people's lives - you sure as hell bet doctors deserve every dime and if anything many are underpaid.

Those same middle class families are the people you see (15 years younger) partying every single weekend and going on carribean vacations twice a year in their 20s. Sure, later life can be a grind. But the vast majority of people had a fair shot in this society. And you're saying we should bring upself down despite the sacrifice to make everyone happy? Thankfully, most people in this profession do not share that view. 

[SunAndMoon]

6 minutes ago, medigeek said:

Those same middle class families are the people you see (15 years younger) partying every single weekend and going on carribean vacations twice a year in their 20s. Sure, later life can be a grind. But the vast majority of people had a fair shot in this society. And you're saying we should bring upself down despite the sacrifice to make everyone happy? Thankfully, most people in this profession do not share that view. 

I generally agree with the notion that doctors shouldn't see their incomes lowered, but this right here is ridiculous. What a sheltered life you must've lived to think that this is people's reality, and that their current difficulties (or lack of financial success) is necessarily due to previous years of partying and travelling to the Caribbean having the time of their life [while you were slaving away at the lab or the library].

[medigeek]

2 minutes ago, SunAndMoon said:

I generally agree with the notion that doctors shouldn't see their incomes lowered, but this right here is ridiculous. What a sheltered life you must've lived to think that this is people's reality, and that their current difficulties (or lack of financial success) is necessarily due to previous years of partying and travelling to the Caribbean having the time of their life [while you were slaving away at the lab or the library].

Who said anything about lack of success? I said middle class families. 

[BernieMac]

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[medigeek]

10 minutes ago, YesIcan55 said:

you're extremely ignorant and you are part of the reason that some doctors get such a bad rep. I am actually disgusted by what you said. I personally know many examples of hard working, intelligent, people who have stressful lives and did not get to "party every single weekend and go on caliban vacations twice a year in their 20s." There are so many people that spend 4 years in a biology undergrad, followed by a 2 year Masters, followed by a 5 year PhD, followed by 2-3 year Post Docs (14 years of post secondary- all of their 20's, into their 30's) to fight for scrapes at a job in academia or research. The job they get after 14 years of post-secondary pays a mere fraction of anyone in medicine. They are the ones slaving behind a microscope working to advance society vs the dermatologist who makes one million a year giving people lip fillers and botox. So don't give me that BS. Even the people who decide to work after a 4-year undergrad are not out there doing what you say they are doing. There are countless people who finish engineering (much much harder than a bio degree that most medical students do anyway) who can not find any job. I know mechanical engineering graduates working at superstore living with their parents. Even the ones who can find work live in constant distress that they will be laid off. This goes as well for teachers who have to sub every day for years to even get a 50K job. My teacher friends tell me the gas they spend to drive 1 hour away from the city (and back) just to teach a half day at a school outside the city is almost half of what they made that day. Is teaching not important? I could go on and on about young professionals in almost every field. They can not afford to take a day trip to another province let alone party in an international location. The privileged position of finishing medical school and residency and then getting a job A LOT A LOT other people more than other people and having inherent prestige makes it easy for you to put down other people. You really need to get a grip on reality. EVERY doctor makes the top 1% income, some even in the top 0.5%. I am really heated and could go on but I am going to compose myself because I don't want to be banned. 

Ok... and end of the day, what does the free market say we're worth? Or that xyz jobs are worth? If anything my rant justified what the free market says we're worth. And the rates that we negotiate by (to OHIP) is ultimately below what a free market system would pay. And now what does the free market pay for the jobs you named? 

 

I think you're confused over that we should earn what we deserve when really every wage should be (and is) based on market value. You can attempt to justify your market value when you're paid in tax dollars like doctors are but beyond that there's zero need for justification in general terms. 

[Persephone]

15 hours ago, medigeek said:

That's just the beginning. These guys genuinely believe making more money is evil and everyone should be equal. They're mostly radical marxists who dream of a communist society. And we're going to give these guys power? No thank you. 

lol I love the caricatures people have of the NDP. They're centre-left at best. Their struggle is that a lot of the policies they wanted to do were already completed by the Liberal Party in Ontario. I don't think any of them think making money is evil. They just believe that poverty should be eradicated and that might mean wealth needs to be distributed more evenly through progressive taxation. Why should anyone go without the basic human rights of shelter and food and yet we live in a country that allows that to happen daily while being fully capable of providing those two things at minimum?

[BernieMac]

On 6/4/2018 at 2:20 PM, medigeek said:

Ok... and end of the day, what does the free market say we're worth? Or that xyz jobs are worth? If anything my rant justified what the free market says we're worth. And the rates that we negotiate by (to OHIP) is ultimately below what a free market system would pay. And now what does the free market pay for the jobs you named? 

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[medigeek]

1 minute ago, YesIcan55 said:

I was not saying anything about doctor's pay. They could make ten million dollars if I care. I was talking about your misguided, ignorant, and clearly sheltered views about the life and circumstances about other professionals (teachers, accountant, engineers, etc) and your clear superior attitude about the medical professional. It's people like you why a lot of Canadian medical schools are having initiatives to consider more holistic applicants with diverse backgrounds in their classes. That way they can understand the real life aspect of the lives of their patients and not think in the back of their mind "Im a MD, I deserve all this money and I am superior to you because I studied in my 20's and you didn't because you were partying in Cuba" hur dur 

For one, you're mixing every group together. Two, you don't understand the free market... at all. That's the main issue here. And you act as if middle class people are doing poorly now, why?

[Persephone]

4 minutes ago, medigeek said:

Ok... and end of the day, what does the free market say we're worth? Or that xyz jobs are worth? If anything my rant justified what the free market says we're worth. And the rates that we negotiate by (to OHIP) is ultimately below what a free market system would pay. And now what does the free market pay for the jobs you named? 

 

I think you're confused over that we should earn what we deserve when really every wage should be (and is) based on market value. You can attempt to justify your market value when you're paid in tax dollars like doctors are but beyond that there's zero need for justification in general terms. 

You cannot act like it's possible to objectively evaluate what every different position should be paid. Any evaluation like that would involve a system of qualitative valuation that would be based on an ideological perspective (inherently subjective). The free market is not some objective mechanism, it's a system that derives from our society's evaluation of what type of work we see as more valuable. It's by no means objective.

[Persephone]

Just now, medigeek said:

For one, you're mixing every group together. Two, you don't understand the free market... at all. That's the main issue here. 

Based on your previous posts I don't believe you understand the "free market" (which doesn't actually exist, nor has it ever) yourself.

[Persephone]

For instance, why do the housekeepers in a hotel get paid lower than those in group booking sales? One is a "blue collar job" performed mostly by women and the latter is a white collar job that until recently was almost completely the domain of men. The work itself is gendered and valued as such according to our patriarchal society and class-coded according to our neoliberal society.

[BernieMac]

On 6/4/2018 at 2:27 PM, medigeek said:

For one, you're mixing every group together. Two, you don't understand the free market... at all. That's the main issue here. And you act as if middle class people are doing poorly now, why?

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[medigeek]

Just now, YesIcan55 said:

The median income in Canada is 40K. Read that again. 40K. Half of Canadians make less than 40K. So, yes truly middle class people have a lot of money difficulties in this country let alone work problems. But to you, middle class is driving an entry level BMW instead of a Porsche clearly. 

Yes until you combine incomes with someone else, then you're doing pretty decent.

And I love the assumptions you make haha not knowing anything about my path, which I assure you was more brutal (in the context of this thread) than you think.

[indefatigable]

17 minutes ago, Persephone said:

Based on your previous posts I don't believe you understand the "free market" (which doesn't actually exist, nor has it ever) yourself.

I suppose all comparisons are to the US.  Medicine is anything but the idealized "free market" - restrictions on supply through regulations and limited number of residency positions.  Huge demand with unmet supply creates conditions for higher pay.  There are many Western countries outside the US, that have significant private insurance, but pay much less - ex: Germany for most specialties.    

[BernieMac]

On 6/4/2018 at 2:34 PM, medigeek said:

Yes until you combine incomes with someone else, then you're doing pretty decent.

And I love the assumptions you make haha not knowing anything about my path, which I assure you was more brutal (in the context of this thread) than you think.

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