What impact did "shortage economics" have on how work and production were organized in the East German pharmaceutical industry between 1949 and 1989? East-West comparisons are of help in diagnosing this industry, chronically affected, as it was, by shortages. In this productive model based on "regulation through shortage", chronic and multifarious shortages led to an "arrhythmic Taylorism" with specific forms of labor flexibility, as the pharmaceutical industry dealt with restrictions on the supply side and with fluctuations on the demand side. The many adjustments made to chronic shortages in input sources, quantities, drug formulas and the manufacturing process sometimes jeopardized the chain of quality. As a consequence, original social compromises took shape between sanitary regulations and planning requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]