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Understanding Geographical Imbalances in the Health Workforce

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  • Pieter Serneels
  • Abigail Barr
  • Magnus Lindelow

Abstract

Geographical imbalances in the health workforce have been a consistent feature of nearly all health systems, and especially in developing countries. In this paper we investigate the willingness to work in a rural area among final year nursing and medical students in Ethiopia. Analyzing data obtained from contingent valuation questions, we find that household consumption and the student`s motivation to help the poor, which is our proxy for intrinsic motivation, are the main determinants of willingness to work in a rural area. We investigate who is willing to help the poor and find that women are significantly more likely than men. Other variables, including a rich set of psycho-social characteristics, are not significant. Finally, we carry out some simulations on how much it would cost to make the entire cohort of starting nurses and doctors choose to take up a rural post.

Suggested Citation

  • Pieter Serneels & Abigail Barr & Magnus Lindelow, 2005. "Understanding Geographical Imbalances in the Health Workforce," Economics Series Working Papers GPRG-WPS-018, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:oxf:wpaper:gprg-wps-018
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    Cited by:

    1. Julie Riise Kolstad, 2011. "How to make rural jobs more attractive to health workers. Findings from a discrete choice experiment in Tanzania," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(2), pages 196-211, February.
    2. Sonja Fagernäs & Panu Pelkonen, 2011. "Whether to Hire Local Contract Teachers? Trade-off Between Skills and Preferences in India," SERC Discussion Papers 0083, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    3. World Bank, 2007. "Ethiopia - Capturing the Demographic Bonus in Ethiopia : Gender, Development, and Demographic Actions," World Bank Publications - Reports 7823, The World Bank Group.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Health Care Delivery; Health Workers; Labour Supply; Public Service;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
    • J64 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search

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