IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/esprep/182504.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Price Premium Induced by Branding: A Health Care Case Study

Author

Listed:
  • Kick, Markus

Abstract

Germany’s statutory health insurance (SHI) system has been radically changed in the year 2009 by the introduction of premium equality across all SHI funds. As of today, all funds charge the same price, which is 15.5% of each insurant’s gross income. The option to charge additional contributions as a flat, monthly per head amount in case funds cannot cover their costs has only scarcely been used so far. However, research predicts that this current state of premium equality is soon to be changed (PFISTER, 2009, EIBICH et al., 2011). Based on KICK and LITTICH (2011), I conduct a choice-based conjoint experiment and include the new pricing signal of additional contributions. I find that price is not the dominating criterion on the current market, but equally important to voluntary coverage options. Corporate reputation and a provider’s brand name lose importance, but are still a major quality signal within consumers’ choice decisions. The brand name TK (Technical Health Insurance Fund), as reputational leader, provides additional value for insurants. TK is able to charge up to €1.46 additional contributions from each insurant per month without falling behind their competitors. Compared to the general contribution rate of 15.5% of each insurant’s gross income, of course, €1.46 seems rather low. However, the statutory health insurance funds that already charged additional contributions from their members collected between €5 and €16 per month and head. Using this rational reveals that TK is able to charge close to 10% of the additional contribution range simply due to their reputational advantage. Thus, corporate reputation proves to enhance a fund’s bargaining position towards its potential insurants, as it allows charging and justifying price premiums. A second empirical study reveals that people lack knowledge about funds’ benefit and coverage portfolios and the SHI system in general. Insurants consistently overestimate funds with comparably higher corporate reputation regarding their benefit and coverage details of selected performance categories. Implications for practitioners and policy makers are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Kick, Markus, 2015. "The Price Premium Induced by Branding: A Health Care Case Study," EconStor Preprints 182504, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:esprep:182504
    Note: Reworking the story for a broad target audience focussed on practitioners. Cf. Kick M. (2015): Selected Essays on Corporate Reputation and Social Media. Springer Gabler, Wiesbaden, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-08837-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/182504/1/2.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Winand Emons, 1997. "Credence Goods and Fraudelent Experts," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 28(1), pages 107-119, Spring.
    2. Gre[ss], Stefan & Groenewegen, Peter & Kerssens, Jan & Braun, Bernard & Wasem, Juergen, 2002. "Free choice of sickness funds in regulated competition: evidence from Germany and The Netherlands," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 60(3), pages 235-254, June.
    3. Jacoby, Jacob & Speller, Donald E & Berning, Carol A Kohn, 1974. "Brand Choice Behavior as a Function of Information Load: Replication and Extension," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 1(1), pages 33-42, June.
    4. Richard H. Thaler, 2008. "Mental Accounting and Consumer Choice," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(1), pages 15-25, 01-02.
    5. Rinaldo Brau & Matteo Lippi Bruni, 2008. "Eliciting the demand for long‐term care coverage: a discrete choice modelling analysis," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 17(3), pages 411-433, March.
    6. Jean Tirole, 1988. "The Theory of Industrial Organization," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262200716, December.
    7. Yoon, Eunsang & Guffey, Hugh J. & Kijewski, Valerie, 1993. "The effects of information and company reputation on intentions to buy a business service," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 215-228, July.
    8. Rinus Haaijer & Michel Wedel, 2007. "Conjoint Choice Experiments: General Characteristics and Alternative Model Specifications," Springer Books, in: Anders Gustafsson & Andreas Herrmann & Frank Huber (ed.), Conjoint Measurement, edition 0, chapter 11, pages 199-229, Springer.
    9. Gates, Roger & McDaniel, Carl & Braunsberger, Karin, 2000. "Modeling Consumer Health Plan Choice Behavior To Improve Customer Value and Health Plan Market Share," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 48(3), pages 247-257, June.
    10. Daniel Kahneman, 2003. "Maps of Bounded Rationality: Psychology for Behavioral Economics," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(5), pages 1449-1475, December.
    11. Höppner, Karin & Greß, Stefan & Rothgang, Heinz & Wasem, Jürgen & Braun, Bernard & Buitkamp, Martin, 2005. "Grenzen und Dysfunktionalitäten des Kassenwettbewerbs in der GKV: Theorie und Empirie der Risikolektion in Deutschland," Working papers of the ZeS 04/2005, University of Bremen, Centre for Social Policy Research (ZeS).
    12. van den Berg, Bernard & Van Dommelen, Paula & Stam, Piet & Laske-Aldershof, Trea & Buchmueller, Tom & Schut, Frederik T., 2008. "Preferences and choices for care and health insurance," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(12), pages 2448-2459, June.
    13. Bettman, James R & Luce, Mary Frances & Payne, John W, 1998. "Constructive Consumer Choice Processes," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 25(3), pages 187-217, December.
    14. Kevin Lane Keller & Donald R. Lehmann, 2006. "Brands and Branding: Research Findings and Future Priorities," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(6), pages 740-759, 11-12.
    15. Jan Kerssens & Peter Groenewegen, 2005. "Consumer preferences in social health insurance," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 6(1), pages 8-15, March.
    16. Darby, Michael R & Karni, Edi, 1973. "Free Competition and the Optimal Amount of Fraud," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 16(1), pages 67-88, April.
    17. Manfred Schwaiger, 2004. "Components And Parameters Of Corporate Reputation – An Empirical Study," Schmalenbach Business Review (sbr), LMU Munich School of Management, vol. 56(1), pages 46-71, January.
    18. Amitai Etzioni, 2011. "Behavioural Economics: Next Steps," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 34(3), pages 277-287, September.
    19. Kotha, Suresh & Rajgopal, Shivaram & Rindova, Violina, 2001. "Reputation Building and Performance: An Empirical Analysis of the Top-50 Pure Internet Firms," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 19(6), pages 571-586, December.
    20. Peter Eibich & Hendrik Schmitz & Nicolas R. Ziebarth, 2011. "Zusatzbeiträge erhöhen die Preistransparenz: mehr Versicherte wechseln die Krankenkasse," DIW Wochenbericht, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 78(51/52), pages 3-12.
    21. Chernev, Alexander, 2003. "When More Is Less and Less Is More: The Role of Ideal Point Availability and Assortment in Consumer Choice," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 30(2), pages 170-183, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Kick, Markus & Littich, Martina, 2015. "Brand and Reputation as Quality Signals on Regulated Markets," EconStor Preprints 182503, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    2. Zike Cao & Kai-Lung Hui & Hong Xu, 2018. "When Discounts Hurt Sales: The Case of Daily-Deal Markets," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 29(3), pages 567-591, September.
    3. Determann, Domino & Lambooij, Mattijs S. & de Bekker-Grob, Esther W. & Hayen, Arthur P. & Varkevisser, Marco & Schut, Frederik T. & Wit, G. Ardine de, 2016. "What health plans do people prefer? The trade-off between premium and provider choice," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 10-18.
    4. Giovanni Anania & Rosanna Nisticò, 2004. "Public Regulation as a Substitute for Trust in Quality Food Markets: What if the Trust Substitute cannot be Fully Trusted?," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 160(4), pages 681-701, December.
    5. Tarnanidis, Theodore & Owusu-Frimpong, Nana & Nwankwo, Sonny & Omar, Maktoba, 2015. "Why we buy? Modeling consumer selection of referents," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 22(C), pages 24-36.
    6. Yao, Jun & Oppewal, Harmen, 2016. "Unit Pricing Increases Price Sensitivity Even When Products are of Identical Size," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 92(1), pages 109-121.
    7. Vincze, János, 2010. "Miért és mitől védjük a fogyasztókat?. Aszimmetrikus információ és/vagy korlátozott racionalitás [Asymmetric information and/or bounded rationality: why are consumers protected and from what?]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(9), pages 725-752.
    8. Franziska Rischkowsky & Thomas Döring, 2008. "Consumer Policy in a Market Economy Considerations from the Perspective of the Economics of Information, the New Institutional Economics as well as Behavioural Economics," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 31(3), pages 285-313, September.
    9. Tischer, Sven & Hildebrandt, Lutz, 2014. "Linking corporate reputation and shareholder value using the publication of reputation rankings," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 67(5), pages 1007-1017.
    10. Gatzert, Nadine, 2015. "The impact of corporate reputation and reputation damaging events on financial performance: Empirical evidence from the literature," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 33(6), pages 485-499.
    11. Pim Heijnen, 2013. "Informative advertising by an environmental group," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 108(3), pages 249-272, April.
    12. Miguel Godinho de Matos & Pedro Ferreira, 2020. "The Effect of Binge-Watching on the Subscription of Video on Demand: Results from Randomized Experiments," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 31(4), pages 1337-1360, December.
    13. Joachim Marti, 2012. "Assessing preferences for improved smoking cessation medications: a discrete choice experiment," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 13(5), pages 533-548, October.
    14. Somerville, Jason & McGowan, Féidhlim, 2016. "Can chocolate cure blindness? Investigating the effect of preference strength and incentives on the incidence of Choice Blindness," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 1-11.
    15. Bester, Helmut & Ouyang, Yaofu, 2018. "Optimal procurement of a credence good under limited liability," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 96-129.
    16. Benjamin Pfister & Manfred Schwaiger & Tobias Morath, 2020. "Corporate reputation and the future cost of equity," Business Research, Springer;German Academic Association for Business Research, vol. 13(1), pages 343-384, April.
    17. Simonson, Itamar & Drolet, Aimee L., 2003. "Anchoring Effects on Consumers' Willingness-to-Pay and Willingness-to-Accept," Research Papers 1787, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    18. Tat Y. Chan & Jia Li & Lamar Pierce, 2014. "Learning from Peers: Knowledge Transfer and Sales Force Productivity Growth," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 33(4), pages 463-484, July.
    19. Nolan Ritter & Julia Anna Bingler, 2021. "Do homo sapiens know their prices? Insights on dysfunctional price mechanisms from a large field experiment," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 21/348, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    20. Pedro Bordalo & Nicola Gennaioli & Andrei Shleifer, 2013. "Salience and Consumer Choice," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 121(5), pages 803-843.

    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:zbw:esprep:182504. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/zbwkide.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.