The Health Care Jobs Fallacy

The U.S. health care sector is a rare area of steady employment growth, and health care organizations argue that they play an important role in economic recovery, a role that must not be endangered by reforms that reduce health care spending. But this focus is misguided. The United States is in the throes of the most serious recession in postwar history. Despite improving employment numbers, the official unemployment rate still exceeded 8% in June 2012. Amid this malaise, the health care sector is one of the few areas of steady growth. 1 It may seem natural to think that if this sector is one of the bright spots in the economy, public policies should aim to foster continued growth in health care employment. Indeed, hospitals and other health care organizations point to the size of their payrolls as evidence that they play an important role in economic . . .