That’s the logic Keynes used to suggest that we’d all be working 15 hour weeks by now, with computers doing all the work.

Needless to say, we have discovered that productivity gains are not consistently converted into reduced costs and work hours.

This is definitely a potential future state, but not one I could imagine happening soon. Given that the robots which are currently deployed do not benefit people directly (and even the indirect benefit of lower costs or better investment returns appear to be captured by the upper tiers of the economy), we have no confidence that they would deployed to benefit anyone but their owners.

More likely near-term states are less rosy, given intelligence takes off.

Interesting idea. I cannot say that I can answer affirmatively nor negatively. There are also human elements to be considered. Humans are status-seeking social creatures. There will always be a stain of humanoid-delivered care, no matter how high-quality, as being not as high quality of all-human delivered care. This is, status accounts for a lot.

I can also draw pictures of how dangerous humanoid care can be, as there is a possibility in a break in the chain of responsibility. If a human medical professional messes up, you (or your survivors) can sue and seek damages directly, as well as sue the hospital and insurance system (with mixed results).

With humanoids? Currently, the bar is higher as the entity being sued is not the hospital, nor a person, or even a team. The only entities that can be addressed are the corporation the runs the hospital and the corporation that produced the humanoid. These two entities have an incredible out-sized advantage in terms of sheer delaying tactics, not to mention arbitration clauses and other legal innovations. Most injured will simply give up, which is a legal win for the two entities.

In my opinion, humanoid care will take a large amount of time, damage, and treasure to lower the costs. No actor will willingly give up their cash flow. My view may be too strong.

Doctors are an incredibly powerful lobby in America and are massive beneficiaries of the status quo. Across America, doctors live in huge mcmansions in gated communities, even while medical bankruptcies cripple the working class in the same town. Oh but the administrators! It's not the doctors, it's the administrators... Who are more often than not also MDs.

This is to say, doctors protect their own professional interests and would never permit this.

The price is set by how much providers can extract, not by their costs to provide. It's not at all obvious that a vast reduction in their cost of labour would translate to price reductions.

It's worth keeping in mind that in the U.S. the health marketplace is extremely complicated and cannot be analyzed with simple demand/supply graphs.

No, they wouldn’t get cheaper. The profit margins in the healthcare industry would get bigger.

Lol no