1 option
The Welfare Effects of Restricted Hospital Choice in the US Medical Care Market / Katherine Ho.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Ho, Katherine.
- Series:
- Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w11819.
- NBER working paper series no. w11819
- Language:
- English
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);
- Place of Publication:
- Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2005.
- Summary:
- Managed care health insurers in the US restrict their enrollees' choice of hospitals to within specific networks. This paper considers the implications of these restrictions. A three-step econometric model is used to predict consumer preferences over health plans conditional on the hospitals they offer. The results indicate that consumers place a positive and significant weight on their expected utility from the hospital network when choosing plans. A welfare analysis, assuming fixed prices, implies that restricting consumers' choice of hospitals leads to a loss to society of approximately $1 billion per year across the 43 US markets considered. This figure may be outweighed by the price reductions generated by the restriction.
- Notes:
- Print version record
- December 2005.
The Penn Libraries is committed to describing library materials using current, accurate, and responsible language. If you discover outdated or inaccurate language, please fill out this feedback form to report it and suggest alternative language.