While better pay for care workers could end up being a problem resulting in higher costs, when people like you bring up this topic it is without addressing the potential cost savings to be had by clawing back “administrative” costs.

Yes, there is absolutely some level of administration needed, and no one is arguing that we should make some aspect of care worse to enable better pay for nurses and other care staff.

The argument generally is that there is more than significant overpay happening at high levels (executive and levels close to them) which could be drawn from at little to no noticable difference to the executives and overpaid themselves while significantly improving things for the levels below them.

Oh no, one of them made 3m in a year instead of 4m? That’s 5 whole six-figure positions even with your 20% overhead.

Until such time as these sorts of hypothetical talks about the impact of raising pay begin to also including the hypothetical that this additional pay could come by redirecting money that already exists and already goes into these systems, examining executive compensation packages and the like, you aren’t going to make any ground on the “costs” argument.

Because there’s currently a lot more than 20% of expenses going to “overhead”. Maybe 20% to administrative overhead, plus 50% to executive compensation packages.

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And look, I get that not every exec is Musk, and the margins can be smaller than people may assume. I have family that run a small family business who have to make those sorts of decisions and costs absolutely do add up fucking quick.

But that’s all the more reason to be open and honest about this shit instead of trying to frame this with only one side.

There probably are some hospitals out in podunk nowhere where there isn’t anything left to cut from the execs and administration, but there are plenty of places (at least in the US) that are explicitly for profit.

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So just as I have family running a small family business where things are fair for their grand total of… four employees I think, my wife’s family used to be close with the elder care magnate in their area. Wife’s family matriarch was close friends with the lady who married the elder care magnate.

We had to sit and watch this entitled bitch have a puff-piece novel ghost-written about the trauma of having a dedicated live in care team for her own mother while she declined, dedicated driver and multiple handlers so they could go on beach days still… while her former supposed best friend (my wife’s mother) suffered in one of her husband’s facilities. Had the audacity to message asking if there was anything she could do, but couldn’t even get off her ass and visit. To even risk seeing the true mess of elder care as her husband ran it.

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So yeah, all that shit to say: Yes, the money has to come from somewhere, but there’s a whole bunch of fucking money right fucking there that keeps going into hoards instead of actually being put to use for the betterment of the company/workers/etc.