Health care provision in the public sector is increasingly oriented towards a reduction of vertical integration through fairly heterogeneous methods as concerns the contractual rules and the actors that are allowed to compete. In this paper we model the choice of a benevolent regulator that...

We study the welfare properties of direct restrictions based on cost-effectiveness against indirect methods represented by waiting lists in a public health care system. Health care is supplied for free, but with some restrictions by the public health sector. Patients can choose to address their...

Health care usually represents a so called merit good, i.e. a good whose consumption should be promoted and given that in most cases it might be essential to restore health or to stop its decay, most countries have implemented a public health care system where care is supplied to anybody needing...

The paper studies the incentive for providers to invest in new health care technologies under alternative payment systems, when the patients' benefits are uncertain. If the reimbursement by the purchaser includes both a variable (per patient) and a lump-sum component, efficiency can be ensured...

Patient mobility is a key issue in the EU who recently passed a new law on patients' right to EU-wide provider choice. In this paper we use a Hotelling model with two regions that differ in technology to study the impact of patient mobility on health care quality, health care financing and...