Abstract:
Increasing costs of most healthcare systems result in (major) financing problems and thus are the focus of many empirical inquiries. Researchers have found that mismanagement is often a consequence of misplaced incentives. This paper tries to outline some cases in which the demand side of healthcare changes its behaviour under different circumstances or incentives. An introduction is given as a short overview of the healthcare sector with its economical specialties. This is followed by an outline of some well established contract models and their effect on the demander’s incentives. The paper concludes with the presentation of three specific cases studied. Showing differences in the demander’s behaviour and health under the influence of differing incentives, this paper tries to point out possible targets for expense reduction and increased efficiency.