IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bde/opaper/1107.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Health care expenditure in the oecd countries: efficiency and regulation

Author

Listed:
  • Pablo Hernández de Cos

    (Banco de España)

  • Enrique Moral-Benito

    (Banco de España)

Abstract

The containment of health care expenditure is one of the major challenges facing public policymakers in the developed countries. This paper provides evidence of significant differences in the cross-country level of efficiency of health care expenditure, meaning that potential cost savings for the countries considered least efficient might be very high. Further, a significant relationship is found between the various health care policies and institutions in the OECD countries and the efficiency levels of health care systems. The findings are, however, highly sensitive to the efficiency-estimation methodology used.

Suggested Citation

  • Pablo Hernández de Cos & Enrique Moral-Benito, 2011. "Health care expenditure in the oecd countries: efficiency and regulation," Occasional Papers 1107, Banco de España.
    • Handle: RePEc:bde:opaper:1107
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.bde.es/f/webbde/SES/Secciones/Publicaciones/PublicacionesSeriadas/DocumentosOcasionales/11/Fich/do1107e.pdf
    File Function: First version, December 2011
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gong, Byeong-Ho & Sickles, Robin C., 1992. "Finite sample evidence on the performance of stochastic frontiers and data envelopment analysis using panel data," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 51(1-2), pages 259-284.
    2. William Greene, 2004. "Distinguishing between heterogeneity and inefficiency: stochastic frontier analysis of the World Health Organization's panel data on national health care systems," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(10), pages 959-980, October.
    3. Oecd, 2006. "Projecting OECD Health and Long-Term Care Expenditures: What Are the Main Drivers?," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 477, OECD Publishing.
    4. Pedro Pita Barros, 1998. "The black box of health care expenditure growth determinants," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 7(6), pages 533-544, September.
    5. Brigitte Dormont & Hélène Huber, 2006. "Ageing and changes in medical practices : reassessing theinfluence of demography," Post-Print halshs-00274723, HAL.
    6. Lopez-Casasnovas, Guillem & Puig-Junoy, Jaume, 2000. "Review of the literature on reference pricing," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 87-123, November.
    7. Jason Shafrin, 2010. "Operating on commission: analyzing how physician financial incentives affect surgery rates," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 19(5), pages 562-580, May.
    8. Brekke, Kurt R. & Nuscheler, Robert & Straume, Odd Rune, 2007. "Gatekeeping in health care," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 149-170, January.
    9. Schmidt, Peter & Sickles, Robin C, 1984. "Production Frontiers and Panel Data," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 2(4), pages 367-374, October.
    10. Unto Häkkinen & Isabelle Joumard, 2007. "Cross-Country Analysis of Efficiency in OECD Health Care Sectors: Options for Research," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 554, OECD Publishing.
    11. Seshamani, Meena & Gray, Alastair M., 2004. "A longitudinal study of the effects of age and time to death on hospital costs," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 217-235, March.
    12. Alan M. Garber & Jonathan Skinner, 2008. "Is American Health Care Uniquely Inefficient?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(4), pages 27-50, Fall.
    13. Timothy J. Coelli & D.S. Prasada Rao & Christopher J. O’Donnell & George E. Battese, 2005. "An Introduction to Efficiency and Productivity Analysis," Springer Books, Springer, edition 0, number 978-0-387-25895-9, September.
    14. Xavier Sala-I-Martin & Gernot Doppelhofer & Ronald I. Miller, 2004. "Determinants of Long-Term Growth: A Bayesian Averaging of Classical Estimates (BACE) Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 813-835, September.
    15. Dranove, David & Satterthwaite, Mark A., 2000. "The industrial organization of health care markets," Handbook of Health Economics, in: A. J. Culyer & J. P. Newhouse (ed.), Handbook of Health Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 20, pages 1093-1139, Elsevier.
    16. Bjurek, Hans & Hjalmarsson, Lennart & Forsund, Finn R., 1990. "Deterministic parametric and nonparametric estimation of efficiency in service production : A comparison," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1-2), pages 213-227.
    17. Office of Health Economics, 2007. "The Economics of Health Care," For School 001490, Office of Health Economics.
    18. Bruce Hollingsworth & John Wildman, 2003. "The efficiency of health production: re‐estimating the WHO panel data using parametric and non‐parametric approaches to provide additional information," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 12(6), pages 493-504, June.
    19. Peter Zweifel & Stefan Felder & Markus Meiers, 1999. "Ageing of population and health care expenditure: a red herring?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 8(6), pages 485-496, September.
    20. Valérie Paris & Marion Devaux & Lihan Wei, 2010. "Health Systems Institutional Characteristics: A Survey of 29 OECD Countries," OECD Health Working Papers 50, OECD Publishing.
    21. Getzen, Thomas E., 2000. "Health care is an individual necessity and a national luxury: applying multilevel decision models to the analysis of health care expenditures," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2), pages 259-270, March.
    22. Alan M. Garber & Jonathan Skinner, 2008. "Is American Health Care Uniquely Inefficient?," NBER Working Papers 14257, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    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. Jacob Novignon & Solomon Olakojo & Justice Nonvignon, 2012. "The effects of public and private health care expenditure on health status in sub-Saharan Africa: new evidence from panel data analysis," Health Economics Review, Springer, vol. 2(1), pages 1-8, December.
    2. Samer Hamidi & Fevzi Akinci, 2016. "Measuring Efficiency of Health Systems of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region Using Stochastic Frontier Analysis," Applied Health Economics and Health Policy, Springer, vol. 14(3), pages 337-347, June.
    3. Novignon, Jacob, 2015. "On the efficiency of public health expenditure in Sub-Saharan Africa: Does corruption and quality of public institutions matter?," MPRA Paper 39195, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Novignon, Jacob & Nonvignon, Justice, 2015. "Fiscal space for health in Sub-Saharan African countries: an efficiency approach," MPRA Paper 63015, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Novignon, Jacob & Lawanson, Akanni, 2014. "Efficiency of health systems in sub-Sahara Africa: a comparative analysis of time varying stochastic frontier models," MPRA Paper 56897, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    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. Pablo Cos & Enrique Moral-Benito, 2014. "Determinants of health-system efficiency: evidence from OECD countries," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 14(1), pages 69-93, March.
    2. repec:dau:papers:123456789/7972 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Christine de la Maisonneuve & Joaquim Oliveira Martins, 2013. "Public Spending on Health and Long-term Care: A new set of projections," OECD Economic Policy Papers 6, OECD Publishing.
    4. Colombier, Carsten & Weber, Werner, 2009. "Projecting health-care expenditure for Switzerland: further evidence against the 'red-herring' hypothesis," MPRA Paper 26747, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Nov 2009.
    5. Błażej Łyszczarz, 2018. "Determinanty wydatków na zdrowie w gospodarstwach domowych w Polsce," Gospodarka Narodowa. The Polish Journal of Economics, Warsaw School of Economics, issue 1, pages 137-157.
    6. de Meijer, Claudine & Koopmanschap, Marc & d' Uva, Teresa Bago & van Doorslaer, Eddy, 2011. "Determinants of long-term care spending: Age, time to death or disability?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 425-438, March.
    7. Colombier, Carsten, 2012. "Drivers of health care expenditure: Does Baumol's cost disease loom large?," FiFo Discussion Papers - Finanzwissenschaftliche Diskussionsbeiträge 12-5, University of Cologne, FiFo Institute for Public Economics.
    8. Maciej Lis, 2015. "Red Herring in the Vistula River: Time-to-Death and Health Care Expenditure," IBS Working Papers 13/2015, Instytut Badan Strukturalnych.
    9. Hartwig, Jochen, 2008. "What drives health care expenditure?--Baumol's model of 'unbalanced growth' revisited," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 603-623, May.
    10. Colombier, Carsten, 2012. "Healthcare expenditure projections up to 2060," MPRA Paper 104919, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Novignon, Jacob & Lawanson, Akanni, 2014. "Efficiency of health systems in sub-Sahara Africa: a comparative analysis of time varying stochastic frontier models," MPRA Paper 56897, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Friedrich Breyer & Normann Lorenz, 2021. "The “red herring” after 20 years: ageing and health care expenditures," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 22(5), pages 661-667, July.
    13. Murphy, Michael & Martikainen, Pekka, 2013. "Use of hospital and long-term institutional care services in relation to proximity to death among older people in Finland," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 39-47.
    14. Mickael Bech & Terkel Christiansen & Ehsan Khoman & Jørgen Lauridsen & Martin Weale, 2011. "Ageing and health care expenditure in EU-15," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 12(5), pages 469-478, October.
    15. Breyer Friedrich, 2015. "Demographischer Wandel und Gesundheitsausgaben: Theorie, Empirie und Politikimplikationen," Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, De Gruyter, vol. 16(3), pages 215-230, October.
    16. Waibel, Christian & Wiesen, Daniel, 2016. "Kickbacks, referrals and efficiency in health care markets: Experimental evidence," HERO Online Working Paper Series 2016:8, University of Oslo, Health Economics Research Programme.
    17. Jochen Hartwig & Jan-Egbert Sturm, 2012. "An outlier-robust extreme bounds analysis of the determinants of health-care expenditure growth," KOF Working papers 12-307, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    18. Thomas Bjørner & Søren Arnberg, 2012. "Terminal costs, improved life expectancy and future public health expenditure," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 12(2), pages 129-143, June.
    19. Jochen Hartwig & Jan-Egbert Sturm, 2014. "Robust determinants of health care expenditure growth," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(36), pages 4455-4474, December.
    20. Amitabh Chandra & Amy Finkelstein & Adam Sacarny & Chad Syverson, 2016. "Health Care Exceptionalism? Performance and Allocation in the US Health Care Sector," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(8), pages 2110-2144, August.
    21. William Griffiths & Xiaohui Zhang & Xueyan Zhao, 2010. "A Stochastic Frontier Model for Discrete Ordinal Outcomes: A Health Production Function," Department of Economics - Working Papers Series 1092, The University of Melbourne.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Health care expenditure; efficiency;

    JEL classification:

    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • H51 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Government Expenditures and Health

    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:bde:opaper:1107. 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: Ángel Rodríguez. Electronic Dissemination of Information Unit. Research Department. Banco de España (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bdegves.html .

    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.