This paper considers whether privatisation can contribute to the performance of a health care system. In order to answer this question, five well-known criteria of economic performance are proposed. The finding is that privatisation is quite likely to contribute to all of these criteria. The...

"In the present allocation of resources in healthcare, preferences of consumers as the ultimate financiers of healthcare services are judged to be of little relevance. This state of affairs is being challenged because the past decade has seen great progress in the measurement of preferences, or...