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When you hear the prices that you're expected to pay for dental work, you may think, "WOW - there sure are some big profits in dentistry". Well, be assured that, as often as not, by the time your teeth are fixed, the dentist is probably wondering if it's all worth the effort and all of the expense. |
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When a dentist tells you how much your dental work costs, the price must include many costs that the dentist doesn't charge separately for. The price the dentist gives you must include all of the materials and medications that are used - from the rubber gloves, the use of the tools for the initial examination and X-rays, to the tray/s and materials used to take the impressions (what some people incorrectly refer to as "molds"). The dentist also uses the money you give them to pay their office rent, the electricity, the water bill, and pay for the phone equipment and the phone bill that allowed you to call for an appointment. |
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The dentists must also include the actual cost of the restoration/s that the laboratory makes and the costs for putting the restorations in your mouth after the lab completes it. |
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With the money that the dentist collects from you and the other patients, the dentist must also pay all of the people that work in the office. The dentist doesn't bill you separately for the assistant's time or for the receptionist's time. |
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The dentist must also cover the cost of everything you see in the office from the dental chairs and lights, to all of the computers, and |
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| printers, and office furniture that must be paid for. He / she must include the hundreds of other costs that are required to run the office – clear down to the magazines in the lobby, batteries for the clocks, the soap and toilet paper in the bathrooms, the paper in the copier, and on and on. |
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| Now, if you're starting to think that maybe it's not as profitable as you first thought . . . . |
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| Don't forget that the dentist must also try to slowly recover the cost of his / her dental education that provides the knowledge and skills to help you when your teeth need attention. AND, the government requires all dentists to pay for many hours of continuing education classes each year. AND the government requires the dentist and the office staff to pay taxes just like everyone else. |
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| The seemingly high price from the dentist is the same economic system that you experience when you hire other professionals like architects, or CPAs, or lawyers. |
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| Because professionals can't itemize each of their costs, they must charge a high enough hourly fee to pay the cost for their rent and utilities, for their receptionist, and everything down to having the carpet cleaned when needed. It just isn't possible for your CPA or your dentist to bill you separately for each of those costs even though you cause most of them to be required. |
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Yes, we all know about lawyers! Lawyers charge us their high hourly rate (which is intended to include all of the small costs that they can't bill separately for), then they itemize and charge separately for paperclips, phone calls, staples, faxes, postage, copies, Scotch Tape, and everything else they can think of! But that's one of the reasons why lawyers have earned the reputation that they have. |
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| Dentists are not happy that the costs for them are many and high - almost all dentists would like to charge less and not have to spend so much time trying to convince people that they need to get their teeth fixed. |
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