Optimal quality, waits and charges in health insurance

Hugh Gravelle () and Luigi Siciliani ()

Journal of Health Economics, 2008, vol. 27, issue 3, pages 663-674

Abstract: We examine the role of quality and waiting time in health insurance when there is ex post moral hazard. Quality and waiting time provide additional instruments to control demand and potentially can improve the trade-off between optimal risk bearing and optimal consumption of health care. We show that optimal quality is lower than it would be in the absence of ex post moral hazard. But it is never optimal to have a positive waiting time if the marginal cost of waiting is higher for patients with greater benefits from health care.

Date: 2008

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6V8K ... a2e1462780ea0e5c372d
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jhecon:v:27:y:2008:i:3:p:663-674

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Health Economics is edited by J. P. Newhouse, A. J. Culyer, R. Frank, K. Claxton and T. McGuire

More articles in Journal of Health Economics from Elsevier
Series data maintained by Heidi Boesdal ().