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Ziggy's avatar

There are two disparate threads in this post. One of them is a righteous attack on for-profit provisions of human services. The other is a skepticism of market competition. The two threads are not the same. Competitive non-profits can do a decent job of providing human services, as long as they are on relatively short-term renewable contracts. Arguably, they are better than direct state services--competition is valuable, if it is a competition for grants, rather than a competition for profit.

Yes, it is true that non-profits can be suborned, and then behave exactly like for-profits. (Warning sign: high executive compensation.) And like for-profits, they cannot operate on a loss. But most non-profits are mission-driven. Competition among them is a positive good, if managed well.

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David Smith's avatar

As you say, yet another example.

“The chair of the inquiry, Prof Deborah Brennan, provided a supplementary statement urging action to reduce the share of for-profit businesses.”

The ideal share would be zero.

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Dave Irving's avatar

And not just in childcare.

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Tim Dunlop's avatar

I was reading this just after reading about how United Health in the US had "encouraged" nursing homes to add "do not resuscitate" orders to patients records. There's a word for this, I think, and it isn't "cost-cutting".

"Two current and three former UnitedHealth nurse practitioners told the Guardian that UnitedHealth managers pressed nurse practitioners to persuade Medicare Advantage members to change their “code status” to DNR even when patients had clearly expressed a desire that all available treatments be used to keep them alive."

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/21/unitedhealth-nursing-homes-payments-hospital-transfers

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Suzy Byrnes's avatar

Agree, not-for-profits and community based organisations are important to human services. My best child care experience was operated by Wesley Mission. My favourite local community group, Communify, is grant funded.

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Robertiton's avatar

I enjoyed the podcast linked below, which is about an interesting similarity between communism and neoliberalism. The point is that both involve specifying an extraordinary degree of detail in the mechanics of public provision.

https://newbooksnetwork.com/late-soviet-britain

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Jim Gleeson's avatar

/& the Productivity Commission should “have no place, or at most a peripheral place, in the provision of” advice to govt … ie abolish, then re-establish a suitable alternative …

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