The Market for Paid Sick Leave

Simen Markussen and Knut Røed (knut.roed@frisch.uio.no)

No 9825, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: In many countries, general practitioners (GPs) are assigned the task of controlling the validity of their own patients' insurance claims. At the same time, they operate in a market where patients are customers free to choose their GP. Are these roles compatible? Can we trust that the gatekeeping decisions are untainted by private economic interests? Based on administrative registers from Norway with records on sick pay certification and GP-patient relationships, we present evidence to the contrary: GPs are more lenient gatekeepers the more competitive is the physician market, and a reputation for lenient gatekeeping increases the demand for their services.

Keywords: absenteeism; gatekeeping; competition; role-conflicts (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H55 I11 I18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 pages
Date: 2016-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur, nep-hea, nep-ias and nep-pbe
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Published - revised version published in: Journal of Health Economics, 2017, 55, 244-261

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Related works:
Journal Article: The market for paid sick leave (2017)
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