You missed the point of my post Ed!

I was comparing optometrists with chiropodists for a comparison example. As far as I know, most optometrists are in private practise and their competition is opthamologists and MDs with computerized eye testing equipment. According to other posters, the speculation is, there are 2000 eye testers in the province and that's it. No nurses eye testers, no chiropractic eye refractor adjusters, no OT oculists, no PT photo-eye correctors, no queer eye adjustors for the hyperopically/myopically challenged, no eye fixors selling snake oil eye fixit drops. Whereas, chiropodists have a plethora of competition from MDs & orthopods doing nail surgery and a full range of foot treatments -all fully covered by OHIP, nursing foot specialists, DCs, OTs and PTs (and even RMTs) doing orthotics and even competition from (previous snake oil) orthopodic-sellers pedalling custom made pseudo-orthotics made from 100% genuine thermopoly-unobtainium. I couldn't compare to anesthesiologists (their only competition was other anesthesiologists) they work in hospitals, bill per operation and are currently averaging incomes of $350,000 per year. (Are they happy with such big incomes? I don't know but I can bet that most chiropodists making 5-10% of that income would be much happier if they were making just 20% (of $350,000/year) pre-income tax income.) In fact, there's such a shortage of them that the Ontario government allowed for dentists to train as dental anesthesiologist and (according to newspaper stories) will be permitting nurses to train in anesthesiology and become nurse-anesthesiologists. The purpose of the employee to optometrist comparison was to indicate how much demand the optometrist was faced with and needed that much support. The number of employees did not imply a state of happiness. The optometrist may be less satisfied with his profession than you are, he may have been frustrated by putting up with employees not showing up or calling in sick, so now an office manager is running the clerical support. Recently, the McGuinty government cut OHIP coverage for eye examinations by optometrists and this has probably meant a drop in business and there could have been staff cuts (= possibly more frustration for him). I don't know... people can't really go anywhere else for an eye exam. The dispensing optician is not about to try to do an eye exam and try to provide the correct prescription eyeglasses.

I think that you should have pointed out to Amanda in your original post that you were doing OK and others are doing OK but there are lots that found that the uncontrolled competition situation in the foot care realm too much to make a decent income. So they quit the profession because although they were making annual gross incomes of $40,000-$50,000 their pre-income tax income was often less than $25,000 and that income is not worth it when people are putting in so much work just to pay overhead and put up with a lot of B.S.

BTW you didn't address the second and more important part of my post so I copied it here (and added a few tidbits) for you to read and should you have some insights or comments and/or time, please respond.

Mr Ed, if the Ontario Society of Chiropodists proved that the public is unable to access chiropodists because the public doesn't know what a chiropodist is, then why are all the no-charge chiropody clinics so busy that they have 6 month waiting lists?????? I have no trouble getting an appointment for a private practise chiropodist OR a private practise podiatrist within 36 hours, yet because the no charge chiropody clinics are FREE, there is an unlimited demand situation at the publicly funded chiropody clinics. By the way the public should have been also asked during the survey, if they know how to use the Yellow Pages. When I looked up foot specialist... I was referred to chiropodist, podiatrist and foot care nurse. And since the public knows that you can't access most specialists without a referral by a MD, most people end up seeing their MD for foot problems. If the MD has time, she or he will provide treatment or if the problem requires an orthopedic surgeon or physiotherapy that's where the patient is referred, or if the condition requires a chiropodist, then the patient is usually referred to a NO-CHARGE chiropodist. Don't believe me? Phone any MD and ask if you can be referred to a no-charge "OHIP covered" chiropody clinic and most will know of one or two chiropody clinics that are "fully or almost fully covered" and that you will have to wait 6+ months for a treatment.