Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/103842 
Year of Publication: 
2013
Series/Report no.: 
Discussion Papers No. 13-03
Publisher: 
University of Bern, Department of Economics, Bern
Abstract: 
We analyze whether the possibility for physicians to dispense drugs increases health care expenditures due to the incentives created by the markup on drugs sold. Using comprehensive physician-level data from Switzerland, we exploit the fact that there is regional variation in the dispensing regime to estimate policy effects. The empirical strategy consists of doubly-robust estimation which combines inverse-probability weighting with regression. Our main finding suggests that if dispensing is permitted, physicians produce significantly higher drug costs in the order of 30% per patient.
Subjects: 
health care costs
drug expenditures
physician dispensing
supply-induced demand
treatment effects.
JEL: 
I11
I18
C21
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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