Health care or health trade? A historic moment of choice.

Abstract

During the 20th century, medical care evolved from a notional economy of trying to a real economy of doing. Care systems can therefore usefully be measured and evaluated as production systems. Whether they will succumb to the pattern of competitive commodity production for profit in the market, or will succeed in developing their own new gift economy for human needs, will become a dominant political and economic issue in the 21st century. Health care is now becoming industrialized in essentially the same way as textile manufacture was industrialized in the 19th century, with corresponding loss of control by skilled workers over their work processes. The outcome of the struggle between skilled handloom weavers and their industrializing employers was determined by the huge rise in productivity associated with machines. The outcome of current struggles between public service and state-subsidized corporate care for profit will be decided likewise by superior productivity. Evidence suggests that in terms of health outcome, democratized public care with a much expanded and diversified workforce could be far more productive than industrialization.