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Do People Pay Higher Bribes for Urgent Services ?: Evidence from Informal Payements to Doctors in Vietnam

Author

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  • Quoc-Anh Do

    (Département d'économie)

  • Trang Van Nguyen

    (World Bank)

  • Anh Tran

    (Indiana University)

Abstract

We study how the urgency of a public service affects its corruption level by analyzing thousands of reported bribes made by inpatients to doctors and nurses in Vietnam. Although it is commonly expected that citizens need to pay a higher bribe to receive a more valuable or urgent service, we find the opposite. Acute patients, despite having conceivably higher benefits of treatment, are 8 percentage points less likely than non-acute patients to pay bribes. If they do, they pay 18% less in bribes. This behavior suggests that even in a highly corrupt environment, public servants face an incentive to provide important services for citizens. To understand this incentive, we show that acute patients pay relatively lower bribes in facilities that are better monitored and audited more frequently.

Suggested Citation

  • Quoc-Anh Do & Trang Van Nguyen & Anh Tran, 2013. "Do People Pay Higher Bribes for Urgent Services ?: Evidence from Informal Payements to Doctors in Vietnam," Sciences Po publications info:hdl:2441/3tk4fhvbi18, Sciences Po.
    • Handle: RePEc:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/3tk4fhvbi18ndq2n4gs2e9pp6j
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Bribes; Corruption; Doctors; Acute Diseases;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D73 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Bureaucracy; Administrative Processes in Public Organizations; Corruption
    • I15 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Economic Development
    • O53 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Asia including Middle East

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