Healthcare jobs fuel revival in Pittsburgh (LA Times)

[gg]

Originally Posted by AaronPGH

The healthcare bubble is the single scariest thing about the Pittsburgh economy in 2012. I think education could be a similar issue, but not quite as worrying.

Yes, this is correct. Diversification would be good for Pittsburgh because all industries expand and contract, just like all economies. Pittsburgh will hopefully attract some other industries to soften the blow when UPMC contracts. Seems they can expand a lot right now, but when you can get away with charging about $4K for an MRI, I guess it is easy to expand. Glad there are choices out there. Got an MRI done with the same equipment for $350. Not that there was much of a savings. Only $3650. I was thinking about getting the MRI at UPMC of course. I mean who would need that $3650?

[ferraris]

Keep in mind that not all of the Pittsburgh's health care economy is health services. We also have research and equipment companies like McKesson and MedRad. Even large parts of UPMC are dedicated to insurance and selling electronic health records and other health IT products to practices and hospitals across the globe.

[WhoIsStanwix?]

Originally Posted by ferrarisnowday

Keep in mind that not all of the Pittsburgh's health care economy is health services. We also have research and equipment companies like McKesson and MedRad. Even large parts of UPMC are dedicated to insurance and selling electronic health records and other health IT products to practices and hospitals across the globe.

Is this supposed to be a good thing or a bad thing?

I guess in a way, good, as the medical economy is somewhat internally diversified, with a global component that includes drugs, devices, and equipment.

Would be interesting to see if we could turn our monolithic UMPC/Pitt Med School giant into a training center for foreign medical practicioners, effectively exporting that knowledge at a profit. That, of course, would require dropping of the non-profit status, and probably already occurs to an extent, possibly on a more pro-bono basis.

Healthcare and education bubbles here are going to burst for sure at some point, and I agree with the others that say we need to diversify the local economy.

The question I have, on a more national scale, is what do you do to go from here to maintain full employment of our population? Do we really have the need for full employment from the standpoint of giving the population all of the products and services they need (and want?). I think the answer for quite some time has been a resounding "no". This is a very fundamental problem: there just isn't enough that needs to be done, so people and governments tend to invent work, and people and governments also tend to invent demand for this work, all for the sake of "full employment". It doesn't make sense in a lot of ways, and isn't sustainable. We just don't have enough resources on our planet to fuel exponential growth in production, GDP, etc. for years to come. There will be a massive fundamental shift in economics in the coming years. Pain will ensue. The real concern for an individual should be "how do I plan for this?"

[BrianTH]

We are nowhere close to exhausting potential demand for goods and services nationally or internationally, and ever-increasing productivity means we are not really running up against any fundamental resource constraints yet (even oil--we have alternatives, which are just a bit more expensive and getting cheaper in relative terms all the time). So there is still plenty of work to be done and the means to do it.

Of course at some point we may run up against such fundamental limits, but that point may be generations off yet.

[WhoIsStanwix?]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

We are nowhere close to exhausting potential demand for goods and services nationally or internationally, and ever-increasing productivity means we are not really running up against any fundamental resource constraints yet (even oil--we have alternatives, which are just a bit more expensive and getting cheaper in relative terms all the time).

Of course at some point we may run up against such fundamental limits, but that point may be generations off yet.

I think more of what I'm trying to say, is even if we're not running up against resource limits, our productivity has increased at a rate over time which seems like it would mean we don't all need to work. I have no data to back this up, but it will be the main focus of my summer reading regimen, as I know a lot has already been written on this topic. Scalability of production lines, increases in computing power along with invention/improvement of software, improvements in food production, all of these things to me seem like less input is needed from humans to ensure the survival of our species.

[ferraris]

Originally Posted by WhoIsStanwix?

Is this supposed to be a good thing or a bad thing?

I guess in a way, good, as the medical economy is somewhat internally diversified, with a global component that includes drugs, devices, and equipment.

Would be interesting to see if we could turn our monolithic UMPC/Pitt Med School giant into a training center for foreign medical practicioners, effectively exporting that knowledge at a profit. That, of course, would require dropping of the non-profit status, and probably already occurs to an extent, possibly on a more pro-bono basis.

Healthcare and education bubbles here are going to burst for sure at some point, and I agree with the others that say we need to diversify the local economy.

The question I have, on a more national scale, is what do you do to go from here to maintain full employment of our population? Do we really have the need for full employment from the standpoint of giving the population all of the products and services they need (and want?). I think the answer for quite some time has been a resounding "no". This is a very fundamental problem: there just isn't enough that needs to be done, so people and governments tend to invent work, and people and governments also tend to invent demand for this work, all for the sake of "full employment". It doesn't make sense in a lot of ways, and isn't sustainable. We just don't have enough resources on our planet to fuel exponential growth in production, GDP, etc. for years to come. There will be a massive fundamental shift in economics in the coming years. Pain will ensue. The real concern for an individual should be "how do I plan for this?"

I meant it as a good thing, since there is some diversity within the healthcare field, as you pointed out. It's not a case of old people die off = no more patients = no more jobs.

UPMC and Pitt already act on a global scale. Heck, UPMC outright owns a hospital in Ireland, and they also have surgery centers in other countries. And yes, they did drop their non-profit status for their International and Commercial Services Division. I actually didn't realize just how many products/services they were selling until linking to that page.

[BrianTH]

A lot of the world, and a decent chunk of the United States, still doesn't have the basics covered (food, clothing, shelter, basic medical care, and so forth). Then there is a significant gap between that basic level of existence and improvements in lifestyle and family care-taking that most people are willing to work for, and even larger percentages of people live in that gap. So global productivity still hasn't come anywhere close to fulfilling all of our species' potential demand for goods and services--it might someday, but on the other hand history suggests we are very resourceful at coming up with new goods and services we will want, if not necessarily need.

I think a more interesting question, at least for now, is how much of this is monetizable. For example, increasingly more and more people are seeking out information and entertainment available on the Internet. And many of those people are willing to "work" in exchange for what they receive by posting their own information and entertainment products. In that sense, City Data Pittsburgh Forum is a big barter economy, but because it isn't monetized it is difficult to measure in conventional statistics.

[Evergrey]

22 UPMC employees top $1 million - Pittsburgh Business Times

22 UPMC employees top $1 million


Pittsburgh Business Times by Kris B. Mamula, Reporter

...

UPMC Health Plan CFO Scott Lammie, $1.015 million
UPMC Presbyterian Shadyside Hospital President John Innocenti, $1.079 million;
orthopedic surgeon Dr. Freddie Fu, $1.2 million;
Dr. James Luketich, director of the Heart, Lung and Esophageal Surgery Institute, $2 million;
International and Commercial Services Division President Charles Bogosta, $1.3 million;
legal counsel Robert Cindrich, $1.69 million;

...