This year, more than 350 pharmaceutical drugs underwent price increases. Pfizer led the charge, cranking up prices on 80 of the 350 all by themselves.¹ Average Medicare reimbursement has fallen 26% (inflation adjusted) since 2001.

Yet despite everyone charging more, clinicians’ standard of living is falling off. Between 2017 and 2023, physician average income (again, inflation adjusted [US Bureau of Labor Statistics]) fell 3.1%.²

Nurses are in an even leakier boat, with their salaries only rising an average of 2-3% during the same years that inflation has soared 20% or more.³

For patients trying to afford increasingly expensive drugs, there are options: Pharmacy coupons, government assistance, co-payment cards, even online international pharmacies. But for clinicians, less money in a more expensive world is simply that. How is this effecting our healthcare workers in the US? Everyone is looking for ways to cut expenses, eliminating everything from streaming services to vacations, but retirement plans have also become an early casualty, with 40% of surveyed clinicians deciding to delay it.⁴

Then there’s the “b-word.” Burnout. While, yes, burnout is an omnipresent specter in 21^st century medicine, squeezing clinicians into a continuously tighter financial corner is doing nothing to help. Burnout contributes to everything from physical health problems to marital strife, and in the larger view, can lead to labor shortages and reduced healthcare quality for everyone.

The attrition of purchasing power is effecting the world at large, but due to the particularly stressful, demanding jobs that clinicians work (the life-and-death responsibilities they carry), as well as the enormous debt that is usually required to merely enter the field, clinicians like nurses and techs may feel the strain keenly.

A life in medicine is a life of sacrifice. Clinicians understood this when they entered the field. Nevertheless, we all expect compensation equivalent to our labor, and watching it wither is discouraging.

Though precise numbers are closely guarded, one cannot help but wonder how much of the clinicial wage gap could be closed with only a portion of the profits being reaped on skyrocketing pharmaceutical prices.

Thanks for reading,

                   Transonic Systems Inc.

                                  The Measure of Better Results

References:

1. Why Drug Prices Are Rising on 350+ Medications Despite White House Pressure | GovFacts
2. Physician Pay Appears Higher Than Ever. The Reality Is Much More Bleak
3. Why Nursing Salaries Aren’t Keeping Pace With the Cost of Living — and 5 Reasons You Should Be Getting Paid More
4. What Physicians Can Do When Compensation Growth Fails to Match Inflation