Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/315274 
Year of Publication: 
2024
Citation: 
[Journal:] International Journal of Health Economics and Management [ISSN:] 2199-9031 [Volume:] 24 [Issue:] 3 [Publisher:] Springer US [Place:] New York, NY [Year:] 2024 [Pages:] 333-355
Publisher: 
Springer US, New York, NY
Abstract: 
We investigate quality provision and the occurrence of strategic behaviour in competitive hospital markets where providers are assumed to be semi-altruistic towards patients. For this, we employ a laboratory experiment with a hospital market framing. Subjects decide on the quality levels for one of three competing hospitals respectively. We vary the organizational aspect of whether quality decisions within hospitals are made by individuals or teams. Realized monetary patient benefits go to real patients outside the lab. In both settings, we find that degrees of cooperation quickly converge towards negative values, implying absence of collusion and patient centred or competitive quality choices. Moreover, hospitals treat quality as a strategic complement and adjust their quality choice in the same direction as their competitors. The response magnitude for team markets is weaker; this is driven by non-cooperative or altruistic teams, which tend to set levels of quality that are strategically independent.
Subjects: 
Quality competition
Hospital markets
Team decisions
Altruism
Laboratory experiment
JEL: 
C92
D03
D43
D64
I11
L13
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by Logo
Document Type: 
Article
Document Version: 
Published Version

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