Tag Archives: Medical Guilds

Medical Guilds are Bad Medicine

Monopolies, Oligarchy, Elitism, Authoritarianism and Groupthink are hurting patients, driving up costs, blocking innovation, and trampling civil rights

In a broad, metaphorical sense (as often used by economists like Milton Friedman or in historical analyses), the term “guild” refers to professional organizations and regulatory bodies that function like traditional medieval guilds by controlling entry into the profession, setting standards, influencing licensing, and protecting members’ economic interests. Common examples of Medical guilds include:

  • State Medical Boards. They are empowered by individual states to regulate licensing and discipline physicians (the closest to actual “guild-like” control over who can practice). During COVID, state medical boards became notorious for de-licensing physicians for not complying with arbitrary and capricious “standard of care” guidelines promoted by Dr. Anthony Fauci, the CDC (Rochelle Walinski and Dimitri Dasalakis), and the FDA (Janet Woodcock, Peter Marks).
Headquarters of the American Medical Association (AMA), a 52-story skyscraper in downtown Chicago, is located at 330 North Wabash Avenue, Suite 39300, and is known as AMA Plaza. The AMA leases floors 39-47 (265,000 square feet) at an annual cost of approximately 7-8M$. Annual revenue for the AMA is approximately 500M$.
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