and he can cook, he can sing, he can play guitar well, he is good at soccer, his parents are rich (and the boasting continues on endlessly).

Here is my usual (and sarcastic yet but very realistic and pragmatic) counter-argument, which seems effective RE: ceasing a conversation in rather an abrupt manner (and also prevents the party to re-engage any further conversation in near future).

I almost forgot what my counter-argument is here – ‘While I understand he has many talents but unless they can be utilized to generate a steady income stream, these talents are no use in the world of capitalism. On top of it, graduating from a medical school may appear as an exclusive privilege to give your fiance a head start but unfortunately her assumption is completely wrong. I will explain why.

Doctors, lawyers, bankers no longer recognize as a symbolic figure of success, job security, and high social class any more or perhaps not as much as once it was. Marrying a doctor was like marrying a prince and this was true and applicable to baby-boomers generation but not any more. Why? Because doctors are no longer rare – perhaps they are currently in the status of ‘over-supplied’.

Doctors and hospitals are correlated in a positive linear fashion. More hospitals means more patients hence more doctors. In order to create more jobs for new young graduate doctors, having more patients and either increasing the capacity of current hospitals or build new hospitals. Alternatively you will need to have your own medical practice but this option is not available to every graduate doctor.

Fortunately I get to meet with different people in different industries, including the young doctors who are struggling to establish their career path. Almost all of them shares one common problem – there are too many doctors hence the competition is fierce. Some of them have taken a decisive action for own survival by forming a group and opening a medical centre. It is true that opening a medical centre would be a commercially sensible decision but unfortunately this option is subject to your (or your parents) financial constraint.

What now happens to those young talented doctors who are less fortunate than others? Some may form an alliance and look for an investor who can open a clinic for them and split the earnings. Under this scenario the investors have a substantial bargaining power which allows him to ‘adjust’ the split in rather unfair fashion – a typical ratio is 7 (for the owner) : 3 (for the doctor). Does this sound like a modern version of master & slave agreement, doesn’t it?

Now I am about to share a story of a young doctor who has no power to select neither of the above options. I have seen his academic transcript and it is flawless. I have known him long enough to make a reasonable assessment on his integrity and dignity. He does have a genuine sincerity and care for the well-being of patients. What’s missing here is $$$.

Talking to me was more of a ranting session for him – how unfair the world is and how he has been constrained by it. To me personally at least he temporarily has lost an ability to expand his horizon to explore undiscovered (or not yet penetrated) territory (market) – mobile doctor aka home visiting.

As a being a father of 3, I understand the pain of taking children to a medical centre for an immunization. Excluding the very first immunization given for Hepatitis B at the time of birth, a mother needs to take a child at least 6 times for the mandatory immunization. Visiting a doctor 6 times over 4 years does not seem too bad but if you ever raise a child, I am sure that you have visited the emergency unit of a local hospital at least once or twice due to high fever, and waited at least for a couple hours. Having a home visiting doctor would eliminate this massive inconvenience.

I told the young doctor to do some search on the demographic characteristics of his area, especially the number of families with young children. I told him that inexperienced and worrying mothers would be the perfect customer base for his new venture. Just imagine you have a doctor who can visit your home at the time you want and provide a good care of your children as well as elderly citizen who requires periodic medical attention – wouldn’t it be lovely? If the revenue per head per visit is $60 and you have at least 35 patients to visit near your area per week, you could earn just little over $100K per annum. Perhaps you may hold the view that it is not much for a doctor but being free from paying a rent and signing up for an unfair contract to become a salary-paid doctor, I thought home visiting would be worth to try.