Also left unspoken in these "fair" eat-what-you-kill round robin case picking scenarios, is that new grads simply don't have the experience or familiarity with specific surgeons and hospitals to make the same kind of savvy picks as the senior people who know and have been gaming that system for years.
And that's assuming that the same quality picks are even available to them, because someone senior is making the call schedule and inevitably games it to time call/post days with the service lines that typically pay well/poorly.
It's an inherently uneven playing field. The older guys tell themselves it's fair to make themselves feel better, or that their advantage is deserved because they're experienced and have figured out the quirks.
Even if completely "fair" it is still fundamentally a competition between partners. Having worked in genuinely cooperative models where partners don't have to play games to preserve a fair slice of revenue, the entire concept is is just distasteful.
The only game I could get on board with is sticking it to the hospital, as hard as possible. Administrators are cynical adversaries. My partners are ... partners.
