The U.S. health care system is organized around markets. There has, however, been ongoing concern about the functioning of these markets, so much so that some have despaired of these markets working at all. The policy response to this concern has been disjointed. Health care markets are subject...

The U.S. health care system is organized around markets. There has, however, been ongoing concern about the functioning of these markets, so much so that some have despaired of these markets working at all. The policy response to this concern has been disjointed. Health care markets are subject...

We examine competition in the hospital industry, in particular the effect of ownership type (for-profit, not-for-profit, government). We estimate a structural model of demand and pricing in the hospital industry in California, then use the estimates to simulate the effect of a merger. California...

The goal of this paper is to identify key issues concerning the nature of competition in health care markets and its impacts on quality and social welfare and to identify pertinent findings from the theoretical and empirical literature on this topic. The theoretical literature in economics on...

There has been considerable consolidation in the hospital industry in recent years. Over 900 deals occurred from 1994-2000, and many local markets, even in large urban areas, have been reduced to monopolies, duopolies, or triopolies. This surge in consolidation has led to concern about...

The nature, and normative properties, of competition in health care markets has long been the subject of much debate. In this paper we consider what the optimal benchmark is in the presence of moral hazard effects on consumption due to health insurance. Intuitively, it seems that imperfect...

Our objective is to determine the effect of ownership type (for-profit, not-for-profit, government) on firm conduct in hospital markets. Secondary objectives include estimating hospital demand systems useful for market definition and merger simulation. To this end, we estimate a structural model...

In this chapter we review issues relating to antitrust and competition in health care markets. The chapter begins with a brief review of antitrust legislation. We then discuss whether and how health care is different from other industries in ways that might affect the optimality of competition....

This chapter reviews the literature devoted to studying markets for health care services and health insurance. There has been tremendous growth and progress in this field. A tremendous amount of new research has been done since the publication of the first volume of this Handbook. In addition,...

This paper reviews the literature devoted to studying markets for health care services and health insurance. There has been tremendous growth and progress in this field. A tremendous amount of new research has been done in this area over the last 10 years. In addition, there has been increasing...