As we struggle to balance budgets and try and shy away from raising taxes, we need to find the money somewhere. Where? Well look at the groups that supposedly is flush with money and whose numbers are small enough not to make a big difference at election time. Enter doctors and other professionals. It really is nothing short of a direct tax in an inverse way. And why should you care? Because this is all leading to the dumbing down of America. There are many physicians who simply are leaving the practice. Average doctors leave the school with hundreds of thousands of debt and if they can’t make a good living why invest the time and money it takes to be a doctor? And how would you like to have someone less than the brightest mind by your physician? Look at Dr. Mixon – he finally gave up on the system and set up his own shop. But, how many can afford his services? You want to resist attempts to constantly take the easy way to balance the budgets. The real answer is that we will all need to look at tax rates, increase in retirement ages and means testing for Medicare premiums. That is the lion share of our problem and yet the politicians pander to the senseless emotional appeal of saving the average guy from the tax man. We are smarter than that. If paying Medicare premiums, working another year and/or pay a bit more in taxes will allow us to continue to have the excellent medical care we do have, it will be an investment worth making.