During the recent debate on rising healthcare costs, doctors who overcharged for their services were fingered as one of the reasons.

I was reminded of an article that Harvard surgeon and author Atul Gawande had written for The New Yorker. The title of the piece is Piecework and, soon after the opening paragraph, he commented that doctors would usually gripe about their dismal pay while in training, but once they have qualified in their specialities and are well ensconced in their own practice, they would become skittish about their income.