Labor Relations Commons^™

World Champions In Hospital Privatisation: The Effects Of Neoliberal Reform On German Employees And Patients, Nils Böhlke, Ian Greer, Thorsten Schulten

Ian Greer

[Excerpt] Over the past decade, German hospitals have been privatised at a rate not seen in any other country. In response to massive public-sector debt and the resulting investment backlog, many state and local governments have been privatising hospitals. The most common arguments for privatisation are repeated in a recent study commissioned by the association of private hospital owners (Bundesverband Deutscher Privatkliniken - BDPK) namely that private hospitals manage in a more efficient manner and are economically more successful (Augurzky, Beivers et al., 2009). Indeed, in some cases, private for-profit hospital companies have invested generously and turned inefficient public hospitals …