IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cpp/issued/v29y2003i2p227-251.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

What Does Canada Profit from the For-Profit Debate on Health Care?

Author

Listed:
  • Gillian Currie
  • Cam Donaldson
  • Mingshan Lu

Abstract

This paper explores the relevance of the literature on for-profit versus not-for-profit hospital care to the Alberta government's Health Care Protection Act and to contracting-out of health services more generally. Thirty-four studies were identified and most found no difference between for-profit and not-for-profit full- service hospitals with respect to relative costs, quality of care or efficiency - a conclusion that is contrary to more selective reviews of this literature. Further assessment of the content and context of this literature leads us to argue that this "evidence" is irrelevant to Canadian health care and, therefore, the debate on contracting-out.

Suggested Citation

  • Gillian Currie & Cam Donaldson & Mingshan Lu, 2003. "What Does Canada Profit from the For-Profit Debate on Health Care?," Canadian Public Policy, University of Toronto Press, vol. 29(2), pages 227-251, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpp:issued:v:29:y:2003:i:2:p:227-251
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0317-0861%28200306%2929%3A2%3C227%3AWDCPFT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-K
    Download Restriction: only available to JSTOR subscribers
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Koop, Gary & Osiewalski, Jacek & Steel, Mark F. J., 1997. "Bayesian efficiency analysis through individual effects: Hospital cost frontiers," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1-2), pages 77-105.
    2. David M. Cutler & Jill Horwitz, 2000. "Converting Hospitals from No t-for-Profit to For-Profit Status Why and What Effects?," NBER Chapters, in: The Changing Hospital Industry: Comparing Not-for-Profit and For-Profit Institutions, pages 45-90, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Elaine Silverman & Jonathan Skinner, 2001. "Are For-Profit Hospitals Really Different? Medicare Upcoding and Market Structure," NBER Working Papers 8133, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. George W. Wilson & Joseph M. Jadlow, 1982. "Competition, Profit Incentives, and Technical Efficiency in the Provision of Nuclear Medicine Services," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 13(2), pages 472-482, Autumn.
    5. David M. Cutler, 2000. "Introduction to "The Changing Hospital Industry: Comparing For-Profit and Not-for-Profit Institutions"," NBER Chapters, in: The Changing Hospital Industry: Comparing Not-for-Profit and For-Profit Institutions, pages 1-10, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Sloan, Frank A. & Picone, Gabriel A. & TaylorJr., Donald H. & Chou, Shin-Yi, 2001. "Hospital ownership and cost and quality of care: is there a dime's worth of difference?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 1-21, January.
    7. Robinson, James C. & Luft, Harold S., 1985. "The impact of hospital market structure on patient volume, average length of stay, and the cost of care," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 4(4), pages 333-356, December.
    8. Frank A. Sloan & Gabriel A. Picone & Donald H. Taylor, Jr. & Shin-Yi Chou, 1999. "Does Where You Are Admitted Make a Difference? An Analysis of Medicare Data," NBER Chapters, in: Frontiers in Health Policy Research, volume 2, pages 1-26, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Mark B. McClellan & Douglas O. Staiger, 2000. "Comparing Hospital Quality at For-Profit and Not- for-Profit Hospitals," NBER Chapters, in: The Changing Hospital Industry: Comparing Not-for-Profit and For-Profit Institutions, pages 93-112, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Richard Arnould & Marianne Bertrand & Kevin F. Hallock, 2000. "Does Managed Care Change the Mission of Nonprofit Hospitals? Evidence From the Managerial Labor Market," NBER Working Papers 7924, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. S. Baranzoni & P. Bianchi & L. Lambertini, 2000. "Multiproduct Firms, Product Differentiation, and Market Structure," Working Papers 368, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    12. Richard Frank & David S. Salkever, 2000. "Market Forces, Diversification of Activity, and the Mission of No t-for -Profit Hospitals," NBER Chapters, in: The Changing Hospital Industry: Comparing Not-for-Profit and For-Profit Institutions, pages 195-226, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Mark G. Duggan, 2000. "Hospital Ownership and Public Medical Spending," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(4), pages 1343-1373.
    14. Mark Duggan, 2000. "Hospital Market Structure and the Behavior of Not-for-Profit Hospitals: Evidence from Responses to California's Disproportionate Share Program," NBER Working Papers 7966, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. David M. Cutler & Jill R. Horwitz, 1998. "Converting Hospitals from Not-for-profit to For-profit Status," NBER Working Papers 6672, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Becker, Edmund R & Sloan, Frank A, 1985. "Hospital Ownership and Performance," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 23(1), pages 21-36, January.
    17. David M. Cutler, 2000. "The Changing Hospital Industry: Comparing Not-for-Profit and For-Profit Institutions," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number cutl00-1, March.
    18. Donald F. Vitaliano & Mark Toren, 1996. "Hospital Cost and Efficiency in a Regime of Stringent Regulation," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 22(2), pages 161-175, Spring.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lindqvist, Erik, 2007. "Will Privatization Reduce Costs?," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance 660, Stockholm School of Economics.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jill R. Horwitz, 2005. "Does Corporate Ownership Matter? Service Provision in the Hospital Industry," NBER Working Papers 11376, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Daniel Kessler & Mark McClellan, 2001. "The Effects of Hospital Ownership on Medical Productivity," NBER Working Papers 8537, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Paul A. Grout & Michelle J. Yong, 2003. "The Role of Donated Labour and Not for Profit at the Public/Private Interface," The Centre for Market and Public Organisation 03/074, The Centre for Market and Public Organisation, University of Bristol, UK.
    4. Sabina Gandhi, 2012. "Differences between non-profit and for-profit hospices: patient selection and quality," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 12(2), pages 107-127, June.
    5. Pierre Koning & Joëlle Noailly & Sabine Visser, 2007. "Do Not-For-Profits Make a Difference in Social Services? A Survey Study," De Economist, Springer, vol. 155(3), pages 251-270, September.
    6. Chang, Hsihui & Cheng, Mei-Ai & Das, Somnath, 2004. "Hospital ownership and operating efficiency: Evidence from Taiwan," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 159(2), pages 513-527, December.
    7. Jill R. Horwitz & Austin Nichols, 2007. "What Do Nonprofits Maximize? Nonprofit Hospital Service Provision and Market Ownership Mix," NBER Working Papers 13246, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Karen Eggleston & Richard Zeckhauser, 2002. "Government Contracting for Health Care," Discussion Papers Series, Department of Economics, Tufts University 0202, Department of Economics, Tufts University.
    9. Frank A. Sloan, 2002. "Hospital Ownership Conversions: Defining the Appropriate Public Oversight Role," NBER Chapters, in: Frontiers in Health Policy Research, Volume 5, pages 123-166, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Marco Castaneda & Dino Falaschetti, 2008. "Does a Hospital’s Profit Status Affect its Operational Scope?," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 33(2), pages 129-159, September.
    11. Ettner, Susan L. & Hermann, Richard C., 2001. "The role of profit status under imperfect information: evidence from the treatment patterns of elderly Medicare beneficiaries hospitalized for psychiatric diagnoses," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 23-49, January.
    12. Albert H. Choi, 2015. "Non-Profit Status and Relational Sanctions: Commitment to Quality through Repeat Interactions and Organizational Choice," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 58(4).
    13. Mark Duggan, 2000. "Hospital Market Structure and the Behavior of Not-for-Profit Hospitals: Evidence from Responses to California's Disproportionate Share Program," NBER Working Papers 7966, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Silverman, Elaine & Skinner, Jonathan, 2004. "Medicare upcoding and hospital ownership," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 369-389, March.
    15. Cyril Chang & Jennifer Troyer, 2009. "The impact of TennCare on hospital efficiency," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 201-216, September.
    16. Shen, Yu-Chu, 2003. "The effect of financial pressure on the quality of care in hospitals," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 243-269, March.
    17. Richard Arnould & Marianne Bertrand & Kevin F. Hallock, 2000. "Does Managed Care Change the Mission of Nonprofit Hospitals? Evidence From the Managerial Labor Market," NBER Working Papers 7924, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Elaine Silverman & Jonathan Skinner, 2001. "Are For-Profit Hospitals Really Different? Medicare Upcoding and Market Structure," NBER Working Papers 8133, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Shen, Yu-Chu, 2002. "The effect of hospital ownership choice on patient outcomes after treatment for acute myocardial infarction," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(5), pages 901-922, September.
    20. Horwitz, Jill R. & Nichols, Austin, 2009. "Hospital ownership and medical services: Market mix, spillover effects, and nonprofit objectives," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(5), pages 924-937, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cpp:issued:v:29:y:2003:i:2:p:227-251. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Iver Chong (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.utpjournals.press/loi/cpp .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.