As society replaces humans with technology, those whose financial worth depends on “soft skills” have a temporary reprieve. But physicians are low-hanging fruit. Will such developments entirely replace physicians? Of course not. As I told my consulting friend, “No robot’s about to do surgery on me anytime soon.” We’ll always need physicians, but progressively less of them.
And the laws of supply and demand will tighten the stranglehold business has on physicians. When my children were growing up, I advised them, “Don’t choose any profession in which your worth is determined by knowing a body of information or using algorithmic thinking. If you do that, you’re toast.” ”Toast” because monopolies on information have been supplanted by the internet, and algorithmic thinking replaced by computers and artificial intelligence. Incredibly, this seismic shift in what society values has occurred…
