Wow.

That is cool.

I wish I was back in my home town.

I'd like to see non-profit urgent-care types of clinics with docs on salary for routine things like scrapes and ear infections and high blood pressure and diabetes.

America's healthcare system is the 'best in the world,' and apologists for the current profit-driven healthcare system say that doctors can't make any money in a universal healthcare system.

But as a consumer of healthcare services, I must confess that I feel much more comfortable seeing a doctor who got into it because he or she wants to cure people as opposed to someone who got into it for the money.

This is the problem with our shareholder primacy version of capitalism. It assumes people's sole motivation is money, but in the twelve years I served as a career guidance counselor (and I have the right to use the word 'counselor'), by far the majority of people I counseled were motivated by existential meaning as opposed to money.

Now, money is important, sure. I mean, let's not be stupid. We need $X per month to make ends meet. But beyond that, the important things that emerge are work/life balance and this sense of meaning derived from work.

I think there would be many who would eagerly accept such posts because our medical people are constantly frustrated at the administrative burden of third party payment, and the beancounters second guessing them to maximize profits or retained earnings. The profit motive is, after all, in direct conflict with the interests of the patient, and certainly the desires and motivations of the direct providers like doctors and nurses.

and other underserved and poor areas ?

I think any public non profit would still need to offer competitive pay to get the doctors to work there. I don't really have a problem with this.

Sure, american doctors can charge five thousand dollars for a one thousand dollar procedure. They can end up not being paid for thirty percent of the procedures. Then, they can't do as many procedures, because they have to spend so much time arguing with insurance companies.

The end result is canadian doctors end up getting a little less money, but more time on the golf course instead of on the phone.

Sure, they can come to america and set up in a ritzy neighborhood. But then they have to spend more on their house and trying to keep up with their snooty neighbors.

It really ends up being a choice between golf and a phone.

hospitals, ambulatory care centers and residential nursing centers.

There are a number of factors hurting healthcare staffing levels in rural settings. First is the heavy student debt load for doctors. According to Educationdata.org,

.

Now that is nearly a mortgage payment. This, coupled with the fact that most medical providers in rural America get most of their revenue by billing Medicaid, the cuts in the so-called big beautiful bill are in the process of forcing many rural healthcare organizations to close. Not because of no need but because of financial pressures imposed by predatory student debt and Wall Street's insatiable quest for shareholder profits in healthcare insurance, for profit providers and big pharma.

This is a serious issue that is exacerbated by the Citizens United ruling and the corporate corruption that has bought much of our Congress. The Republicans don't even pretend to care about this, and many of the institutional Democrats will not move on the issue for fear of primary opponents heavily funded by the lobbies. Dollars are the 'voice' of corporations, which are people according to our current policy structure.

Now, with $39 trillion in national debt incurred mostly by Republicans, the US government has been declared insolvent. This is because of the Chicago School trickle down economic theory which Reagan took to the White House in 1981. When he took power, and Congress started slashing taxes for corporations, the narrative was that lower taxes would stimulate corporations to create more jobs, and the payroll tax contributions of the new workers would more than offset the permanently lowered corporate tax rates.

Thus, we see, if we think critically about this for a moment, that the burden of funding our government, ostensibly 'of, by and for' the people, has moved from 1970s levels, when corporations contributed around 35% of the tax revenue and individual taxpayers like us paid in around 45%. Now, individual taxpayers pay in around 85% and corporations only 9%.

So we see that the government, due to corporate corruption, no longer collects enough money to fund programs that actually help working Americans at their kitchen tables. This is why Trump thinks we can afford a billion a day on a war of choice while cutting services for us right and left.

This problem could by solved by:
- Taxing billionaires out of existance
- Raising taxes on corporations back to 1970 levels
- Changing the rules of corporate governance to a stakeholder model rather than holding profits above all else

This is why I like Mamdani so much. He is thinking outside the box to solve this Wall Street problem because he has essentially 'nationalized' the food store industry.

And don't be fooled when our corporate owned media and the Republicans call him a commie. Wall Street has a long history of driving imperialistic behavior on the part of our government. We have gone into a number of countries that tried to nationalize industries so they could give their people a fair shake, and done regime changes. Take Iran in 1953, for example. Our CIA put Pahlavi in power because the democratically elected ruler of Iran wanted to nationalize industries. Can't have that!

We did the same thing with a number of countries in central and south America as well as the Pacific Rim. This is called imperialism and the American Empire was in there slugging starting in the 19th century. After we took over the British Raj in 1946, it took less than 20 years for the military industrial complex (MIC) Ike warned us about in his Guns and Butter speech in the early sixties to take over. After the assassination of JFK in 1963, they got LBJ to send 500K Americans over to Vietnam. The motive for the MIC, of course, was profits, and the government spent today's equivalent of nearly a trillion dollars on that war. 58,000 American kids were killed, and 3.2 million Vietnamese dies.

Again, this is what imperialism and shareholder primacy capitalism looks like. This is why the 1971 essay known as the Powell Manifesto called for the Republicans to take over the political nomination process. The purpose there was to send candidates to local, state and national elections that would vote in favor of business interests, i.e. tax cuts, deregulation, privatization and gutting any government programs besides defense and national security.

This is what we have. AOC, Bernie, Mamdani and other progressives know this and this is why they are all reported on by the corporate media as being 'far left radical' or 'far left liberal.' They are not. Wall Street just doesn't like them.

I'll leave you with a joke from the old Soviet Union: A Russian and an American were talking. The American commented on how sophisticated the Soviet propaganda apparatus was. The Russian replied, "Our system of propaganda is not nearly as sophisticated as yours!"

The American looked quizzically at the Russian and said, "What do you mean? We don't have propaganda here!"

The Russian smiled, and said, "See what I mean?"

the poster said "docs on salaries"

My wife is a chef and was making good money with Hello Fresh. She just took a new job (and a pay cut) with an outreach kitchen that serves the large homeless population in the downtown core of our city. She wanted a job that felt meaningful rather than more corporate bullshit day after day.

Some people are just wired that way.

high salaries should still be something offered under non profits to get and keep doctors .

Community Health Centers run by community-based boards, with health care providers on salary, were established in the 1970s.

NYC has lots of them.

bothered by the prospect of him failing. They were afraid he might succeed and show that government can strengthen the social safety net and actually help people.

This scares the shit out of the billionaires, 'cause these ideas could spread, and they would have to pay more taxes. Betsy DeVos might even have to sell one of her 10 yachts.

Then, their greater fear of these same people is that they will vote for a politician who will deliver for them.

There's way too much waste in this country. And, it starts with all the food that gets tossed in trash bins at the point of sale, simply because the expiration date is approaching.

And he is young, so that'll be a while.

Plus he could be any number of powerful cabinet heads. In particular, I could see him at HHS, HUD, Transportation, Labor, or (in my dream world) State.

The savings from city owned stores is coming from no property taxes and no rent. I assume that the employees will be city employees with pretty decent pay and benefits.

It will be interesting to see just how much cheaper prices are. I'm not sure if the city plans to sell groceries under cost using taxpayer subsidies.

.... in NYC. So he is opening up five more? What good is that supposed to do? In a city with a population of 8.5 million these 5 stores are going to accomplish what?