The impact of agglomeration economies on hospital input prices

Artikel

This paper examines the extent to which agglomeration of the hospital service industry enhances the productivity of producing health care. Specifically, we use a large set of private insurance claims from the FAIR Health database to show that an increasing spatial concentration of hospital services results in a decreased cost of obtaining intermediate medical services. We explicitly test whether the reduced cost at concentrated locations arises from the ability to share intermediate service providers. The identification relies on state variation in medical lab technician licensure requirements, which influence the cost of intermediate services only through the cost of running a lab. Our findings suggest that agglomeration of the hospital service industry attracts specialized medical labs, which in turn help to reduce the cost of producing laboratory tests.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Journal: Health Economics Review ; ISSN: 2191-1991 ; Volume: 5 ; Year: 2015 ; Issue: 38 ; Pages: 1-15 ; Heidelberg: Springer

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics: General ; Analysis of Health Care Markets ; Organization of Production
• Subject: Agglomeration ; Health care ; Input sharing

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Friedson, Andrew I. ; Li, Jing
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Springer
• (where): Heidelberg
• (when): 2015

Further information

• DOI: doi:10.1186/s13561-015-0075-1
• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/150518
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:45 AM CET