Greed in Cosmetic Surgery verses Reconstructive “be·nev·o·lent/b??nev?l?nt/A” Surgery

What do you think?

A few weeks ago  friend of mine was expressing to me the concern they seemed to note at a cosmetic surgery meeting. They said to me “these cosmetic surgeons all they care about is money” in a holier than thou attitude.  The attitude reflected the attitude of others I have heard before, who either do not think cosmetic surgery is needed or see the money some of these surgeons make. Well since this was a friend I asked candidly ” do you think that is all I care about ?” My friend said “no”. Well this bothered me to some degree for two reasons. First what is wrong with making money for ones labors ? I mean rewarding people in a competitive fashion with money,  for doing good work —-it actually does work. We have seen this propel society to grow more food for its people. We have seen such a formula of    reward the individual = better production and achievement tried many times and we can observe the failures and the successes of this. Like wise we have seen the formula   reward everyone equally =  less production and achievement proven as well.

In agriculture,  farms that made good production of food  made the most money, the farms that did not produce much food efficiently  lost money and failed. The Soviet economic system completely crumbled due to the lack of incentives other than a banner or badge from the state which said “good job”. Seemed it was not enough to keep things going. More food is a good thing, less food is a bad thing. I think I have made my point here.

So if we apply these principles to cosmetic surgery, what we have is people competing for more money. This means those that do better at cosmetic surgery, produce better results will earn more money than those who produce less results. Although,  in general I think this may be true but  not 100% of the time. People who want cosmetic surgery will want the best I believe. So it follows they will try to find the best for their budget.

So when someone tells my like my friend, Cosmetic Surgeons are only interested in money. In one way –I think that is good thing because of what I said in the above paragraph.  It will produce the best results. A poorly performing cosmetic surgeon will not earn much money and if they are really bad will hopefully go out of business. So in this way, greed is a good thing I think. This is because people have FREE WILL. That is to say,  they can choose this cosmetic surgeon or that one,  depending on what they think is the best. Cosmetic Surgery is unregulated to some degree.

The same applies to many aspects of society. When people are given a choice to work hard and earn more money and if they want more money they work harder, then there are those who try to slide by , talking  a lot or pretending to do a lot,  but do not. The latter typically get rewarded the least with money. That seems fair to me. So I disagree with the notion that cosmetic surgeons greed is 100% a bad thing. It produces the best cosmetic surgeons,  as societies based on a reward system for work performed,  should win. Again we have seen this over and over again,  so I cannot say why people fail to see this.

Now all  rewards are not money. Yet there is a system of rewards which works for some people. Maybe its prestige as seen in academic life such as a promotion to tenure as a professor or a missionary who gives health care free to the poor in some out of the way place like Cambodia. Well they have there rewards as well. They good from their works. I do not think one is worse than the other money verses a good feeling. Both are rewards.

So back to greedy cosmetic surgeons.  Well greed can be good if greed is simply the desire to get some reward such as  money , good feeling or whatever system of values are in place. This is greed? If that is what my friend meant then I think this is a a wrong opinion. What I think is greed in a bad way is when someone wants something through trickery or doing nothing. This means for example a cosmetic surgeon gives Botox charges the patient  for a certain amount then does not give that amount. Like the doctor who went to jail for telling patients he was giving them a cancer drug but sold then water instead which an actual case, That is what I call bad greed. Like wise are people who expect the society to give them something for nothing. We all must contribute.

Contribute is what most cosmetic surgeons have done especially the traditionalist such as myself who were plastic surgeons. Plastic Surgeons are called all the time to emergency rooms to take care of people. Most who have no money and thus the doctor does not get paid. Would you do work for free ? Well I am sure some of you will , but would you do work for free and then risk getting sued? Well most plastic surgeons will and do.

So I have no problem with a cosmetic surgeon who cares about money if that is type of greed. In most ways I think that is good. This is why I am a libertarian and subscribe to some of the philosophies of Ayn Rand.  Please try and understand the difference.

doctor808