We study the incentives for hospitals to provide quality and expend cost-reducing effort when their budgets are soft, i …. Softer budgets reduce cost efficiency, while the effect on quality is ambiguous. For given cost efficiency, softer budgets … increase quality since parts of the expenditures may be covered by the payer. However, softer budgets reduce cost …

(and therefore reduce 'skimping' on such patients). -- hospital competition ; soft budgets ; quality ; cost efficiency …We study the incentives for hospitals to provide quality and expend cost-reducing effort when their budgets are soft, i …. Softer budgets reduce cost efficiency, while the effect on quality is ambiguous. For given cost efficiency, softer budgets …