I've come to a sticking point in my book project because there is just too much current discourse to absorb about the commodification and corporatization of medicine. The medical industry exists to make profit for owners and enrich executives -- even so-called "non-profit" medical corporations are mostly organized around maximizing revenues, minimizing costs, and racking up the big bucks for their managers.
The people who suffer the most from this are, of course, patients. However, it has also produced a huge shift in the status of physicians, who used to constitute what Paul Starr called a "sovereign profession." Physicians were in charge. They were not just professionals, they were owners. They had immense cultural authority, high status, autonomy, and could become wealthy. They're still making more money than most people, and that's something of a salve, but in many ways they are feeling that they are an exploited labor force. Money isn't the only motivation for most physicians, and not being able to do what's right for their patients is very painful for them. Many are leaving the profession, others are feeling themselves emotionally damaged.
I could link to a lot of fancy academic research but today this Kos diary caught my eye. Physicians at Allina Health Systems in the Midwest have voted overwhelmingly to join the Service Employees International Union, the same union that represents janitors, security guards, and food service workers. Allina is an ostensibly "nonprofit" corporation that spends 0.346% on charity care and refuses to treat patients with unpaid bills, while paying its CEO $3.53 million a year. Solidarity forever! Kick their butts.
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