zlacker

> I believe it is the largest industry by employment in every single state now.

This made be curious, so I looked around. FWIW, healthcare constitutes ~11% of the workforce in the US. It's ~16% in Germany, ~10% in the UK, and ~5% in France.

As a percentage of GDP healthcare is far higher in the US, of course.

>>wahern+(OP)
It's actually a really hard thing to track, and BLS does a poor job of it in my opinion. That 11% covers most but not even all people at a clinic or hospital. It counts people from doctors to records specialist, but not say, janitors or IT, and nothing outside of that like insurance. And that's not necessarily wrong to do, but makes it hard to grasp the whole size.

If you add in everyone in insurance, pharma, devices, and the jobs those support, that number seems to be closer to 17% of the workforce from what I could put together.

Not sure if those in Europe do it similarly, but it just feels like a huge number of people. Maybe that is the result of demographics and a topheavy population, though.

>>silisi+W3
Doubt european numbers count insurance (public or private) pharmacy etc or all the jobs that support healhcare in general (powerplants, construction workers, restaurants, etc)

>>silisi+W3
It also doesn't count family members providing care for loved ones 'unpaid'.

Nor does it count any of the people who really should have more or better care but don't get it.

>>mjevan+Ha
Do other countries do it?

>>victor+aa
Well when you get really down to it what is the most important thing in the world? Your health. Not much point being rich if you're in chronic pain.

And thanks to technology and science our first world society's got really good at keeping people alive and relatively comfortable.

>>mjevan+Ha
I don't think unpaid people would mind if they were 'put of an unpaid job' in this case.