Waiting seven days or more to get a report of your recent CT scan? Welcome to today’s new normal. Until a couple of years ago, the digital transformation of radiology dramatically shortened turnaround times of report delivery. The last-century process of audio dictation, manual transcription, editing, and signing final reports was replaced by direct voice recognition software. Radiologists became the transcribers and editors. Turnaround of reports from study time shortened to minutes. Why in this day of AI have lag times in report delivery grown into the week levels even at the top academic centers? The answer lies in the first lesson of economics coined by the famed Stanford economist Thomas Sowell, namely, scarcity. “There is never enough of anything to satisfy all those who want it,” he wrote. The unbridled demand for imaging is rapidly outpacing the supply of radiologists. In a Journal of the American College of Radiology paper by Eric Christensen, the projected imaging utilization based on past trends will be approximately 20 percent higher by 2055. I suspect that is a gross underestimate, as continuation of recent per-person utilization trends dramatically broadens this range. The demand for imaging is influenced by a variety of factors. Population growth, particularly those over 65 where utilization of health care triples per capita, is a main one. Another is that imaging can expedite patient throughput for busy emergency room doctors, urgent care centers, and even primary docs who have 15 minutes to figure out patient disposition. Got a rattling cough or belly pain? Why auscultate when you can image. Part of that is the clinician’s fear of missing a serious condition and subsequent litigation exposure. Next, facilities like imaging centers and hospitals are incentivized by volume as reimbursement diminishes. The U.S. imaging services market is poised for significant growth, projected