IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/tur/wpaper/12.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Does Fiscal Discipline towards Sub-national Governments Affect Citizens' Well-being? Evidence on Health

Author

Listed:
  • Massimiliano Piacenza

    () (Department of Economics and Public Finance "G. Prato", University of Torino)

  • Gilberto Turati

    () (Department of Economics and Public Finance "G. Prato", University of Torino)

Abstract

This paper aims at assessing the impact of fiscal discipline towards sub-national governments on citizens' well-being. We model fiscal discipline by considering the expectations of deficit bailouts by Central Government, and focus on a particular dimension of well-being, namely health outcomes at the regional level. We study then how bailout expectations affect the expenditure for health care policies carried out by Regional Governments: in the presence of opportunistic behaviours by local governments - induced by soft budget constraints - bailout expectations should affect only spending inefficiency, and should not have any real effects on citizens' health. To investigate this issue, we model the efficient use of public resources for health care delivery as an input requirement frontier, and assess the effects of bailout expectations on both the structural component of health spending and its deviations from the best practice. The evidence from a sample of 15 Italian Regions observed from 1993 to 2006 highlights that bailout expectations do not significantly influence the position of the frontier, thus do not affect citizens' health. However, they appear to exert a remarkable impact on excess spending.

Suggested Citation

  • Massimiliano Piacenza & Gilberto Turati, 2010. "Does Fiscal Discipline towards Sub-national Governments Affect Citizens' Well-being? Evidence on Health," Working papers 12, Former Department of Economics and Public Finance "G. Prato", University of Torino.
    • Handle: RePEc:tur:wpaper:12
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.biblioecon.unito.it/biblioservizi/RePEc/tur/wpaper/n12.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2010
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Arulampalam, Wiji & Dasgupta, Sugato & Dhillon, Amrita & Dutta, Bhaskar, 2009. "Electoral goals and center-state transfers: A theoretical model and empirical evidence from India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(1), pages 103-119, January.
    2. Francesco Porcelli, 2009. "Effects of fiscal decentralisation and electoral accountability efficiency evidence from the Italian health care sector," Working Papers 2009/29, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    3. Willam Greene, 2005. "Fixed and Random Effects in Stochastic Frontier Models," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 23(1), pages 7-32, January.
    4. Jondrow, James & Knox Lovell, C. A. & Materov, Ivan S. & Schmidt, Peter, 1982. "On the estimation of technical inefficiency in the stochastic frontier production function model," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2-3), pages 233-238, August.
    5. János Kornai, 2009. "The soft budget constraint syndrome in the hospital sector," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 117-135, June.
    6. 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.
    7. Bordignon, Massimo & Brusco, Sandro, 2001. "Optimal secession rules," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(10), pages 1811-1834, December.
    8. Kumbhakar, Subal C & Hjalmarsson, Lennart, 1995. "Labour-Use Efficiency in Swedish Social Insurance Offices," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 10(1), pages 33-47, Jan.-Marc.
    9. Margherita Giannoni & Theodore Hitiris, 2002. "The regional impact of health care expenditure: the case of Italy," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(14), pages 1829-1836.
    10. Lancaster, Tony, 2000. "The incidental parameter problem since 1948," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 95(2), pages 391-413, April.
    11. Capps, Cory & Dranove, David & Lindrooth, Richard C., 2010. "Hospital closure and economic efficiency," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 87-109, January.
    12. Margherita Giannoni & Theodore Hitiris, "undated". "The Regional Impact of Health Care Expenditure: the Case of Italy," Discussion Papers 99/20, Department of Economics, University of York.
    13. Meena Seshamani & Alastair Gray, 2004. "Ageing and health-care expenditure: the red herring argument revisited," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(4), pages 303-314.
    14. Battese, George E. & Coelli, Tim J., 1988. "Prediction of firm-level technical efficiencies with a generalized frontier production function and panel data," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 387-399, July.
    15. Joseph P. Newhouse, 1992. "Medical Care Costs: How Much Welfare Loss?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 6(3), pages 3-21, Summer.
    16. Bordignon, Massimo & Turati, Gilberto, 2009. "Bailing out expectations and public health expenditure," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 305-321, March.
    17. Kodde, David A & Palm, Franz C, 1986. "Wald Criteria for Jointly Testing Equality and Inequality Restriction s," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(5), pages 1243-1248, September.
    18. António Afonso & Ludger Schuknecht & Vito Tanzi, 2005. "Public sector efficiency: An international comparison," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 123(3), pages 321-347, June.
    19. Battese, George E. & Corra, Greg S., 1977. "Estimation Of A Production Frontier Model: With Application To The Pastoral Zone Of Eastern Australia," Australian Journal of Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 21(03), December.
    20. Retzlaff-Roberts, Donna & Chang, Cyril F. & Rubin, Rose M., 2004. "Technical efficiency in the use of health care resources: a comparison of OECD countries," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(1), pages 55-72, July.
    21. Dov Chernichovsky & Sara Markowitz, 2004. "Aging and aggregate costs of medical care: conceptual and policy issues," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(6), pages 543-562.
    22. Battese, G E & Coelli, T J, 1995. "A Model for Technical Inefficiency Effects in a Stochastic Frontier Production Function for Panel Data," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 20(2), pages 325-332.
    23. Martin Besfamille & Ben Lockwood, 2008. "Bailouts In Federations: Is A Hard Budget Constraint Always Best?," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 49(2), pages 577-593, May.
    24. Subal Kumbhakar, 2010. "Efficiency and productivity of world health systems: where does your country stand?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(13), pages 1641-1659.
    25. Greene, William, 2005. "Reconsidering heterogeneity in panel data estimators of the stochastic frontier model," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 126(2), pages 269-303, June.
    26. Luca Crivelli & Massimo Filippini & Ilaria Mosca, 2006. "Federalism and regional health care expenditures: an empirical analysis for the Swiss cantons," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(5), pages 535-541.
    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. Francese, Maura & Piacenza, Massimiliano & Romanelli, Marzia & Turati, Gilberto, 2014. "Understanding inappropriateness in health spending: The role of regional policies and institutions in caesarean deliveries," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 262-277.
    2. Rosta, Miklós, 2015. "Introduction of soft budget constraint to analyze public administration reforms. Some evidence from the Hungarian public administration reform," MPRA Paper 68473, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Maura Francese & Massimiliano Piacenza & Marzia Romanelli & Gilberto Turati, 2011. "Understanding Inappropriateness in Health Care: The Role of Supply Structure, Pricing Policies and Political Institutions in Caesarean Deliveries," ERSA conference papers ersa11p1439, European Regional Science Association.
    4. Joan Costa-Font & Gilberto Turati, 2016. "Regional Health Care Decentralization in Unitary States: Equal Spending, Equal Satisfaction?," LEQS – LSE 'Europe in Question' Discussion Paper Series 113, European Institute, LSE.
    5. Cappellari, Lorenzo & De Paoli, Anna & Turati, Gilberto, 2014. "Do Market Incentives in the Hospital Industry Affect Subjective Health Perceptions? Evidence from the Italian PPS-DRG Reform," IZA Discussion Papers 8636, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    6. Lorenzo Cappellari & Anna De Paoli & Gilberto Turati, 2016. "Do market incentives for hospitals affect health and service utilization?: evidence from prospective pay system–diagnosis-related groups tariffs in Italian regions," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 179(4), pages 885-905, October.
    7. Lorenzo Cappellari & Anna De Paoli & Gilberto Turati, 2016. "Do Market Incentives for Hospitals Affect Health and Service Utilization? Evidence from PPS-DRG Tariffs in Italian Regions," CESifo Working Paper Series 5804, CESifo Group Munich.
    8. Cavalieri, Marina & Ferrante, Livio, 2016. "Does fiscal decentralization improve health outcomes? Evidence from infant mortality in Italy," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 74-88.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Intergovernmental relationships; Soft budget constraint; Bailout expectations; Health care policy; Spending efficiency;

    JEL classification:

    • H51 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Government Expenditures and Health
    • H77 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - Intergovernmental Relations; Federalism
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:tur:wpaper:12. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Simone Pellegrino). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/dstorit.html .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.