Exploitative would require the programs to care. The only thing seem to care about is warm bodies. It is obvious based on resident rosters which programs are taking people outside of the matched based on the two requirements of (1) Can you get a training license and (2) Are you alive? Shame on them, especially after we sat in committees and watched them pick exceptionally qualified candidates apart and not rank them based on being nervous or clothing choice or other trivial things only a few years ago.
Exploitative is the contract I just saw for a rural hospital position that locks the employee into a multiyear agreement and makes the employee pay back a year's worth of salary if there is a voluntary resignation, along with other things such as 10% decrease in salary every year, clause that says hospital keeps >50% of professional fees above a certain threshhold, annual income caps, etc. When you sign up for the Army at age 18, they make it clear that they own you and you can't leave. At least they are upfront and honest about it. I can't imagine taking that job and knowing you are trapped.
So maybe hiring these people is exploitative in that it is setting them up to exploited by a hospital in rural Iowa that's been running on locums for many years while trying to snag someone who needs a visa on the cheap?
I cannot get a practice in Florida to interview me. I have tried for years. Yet I am also told that concerns about there being no jobs are "bull---t". I came from a good medical school and passed all my exams and look fine on paper with zero red flags. My residency was in the Midwest though. What does the Caribbean grad think is going to happen training in Iowa with her C.V. when employers are already this picky? Will she get an interview at a private practice in Florida? Or will she be working in the tiny town above for 10% less every year for the rest of her career getting to enjoy the smell of the local feedlot when walking out of clinic every day?