Presented by: Qianwei Shen

By KATE TULENKO

Resource: New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/14/opinion/americas-health-worker-mismatch.html?ref=views

While nearly all other sectors shrank during the recession, jobs in health care increased by more than 1.2 million, with most paying salaries of over $60,000.

The Affordable Care Act will add 32 million people to insurance rolls over the next several years, while the aging of America will drive the need for health care for decades to come.

Good news for health workers?

Not necessary!

Crowded medical professional schools are turning away hundreds of thousands of qualified applicants.

To fill the gap, we are importing tens of thousands of foreign workers: 12 percent of the health work force is foreign-born and trained, including a quarter of all physicians.

That’s bad for American workers, but even worse for the foreign workers’ home countries.

Blames:

1. Primarily with the woeful state of schools in the health professions.

2. The per graduate cost of health professional education has increased faster than average high education: over the past 20 years, public medical school tuitions have increased 312 percent.

3. State regulator: In some fields, a therapist who once needed a master’s degree must now have a doctorate to get a license,

In response, schools should be required to pay attention to cost effectiveness and train more workers with their existing budgets.

Meanwhile, the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services could mandate that all new licensing requirements be justified with cost-effectiveness data; they could also require schools to communicate with employers to gauge the numbers and skills of workers needed.

It is irrational and immoral to recruit health workers from countries where one in five children die before their fifth birthday when we could be recruiting and training workers domestically.

Doing so would help our economy, global public health and the 314 million Americans who rely on our medical system to provide high-quality, affordable care.

Quality s

Quanti

ty n

ds/dn > 0

ds/dn < 0