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Abstract

This paper most generally seeks to account for why governments pay doctors as they do. It evaluates the hypothesis that, among western industrial countries, widely known physician preferences on method of pay determine subsequent policy, whatever the bargaining arrangements and distinctive national political setting. Two bodies of data are used: primary studies of payment method decisions in Sweden, England, and the United States, and secondary information on methods of payment employed throughout the world complied by Glaser. The data proved consistent with the factual hypothesis. The explanation offered stresses the structural imbalance between the political resources (and willingness to use them) of physicians and governments on questions of payment method. This account has policy implications quite different from those stressing the impact of bargaining forms and settings in payment method decisions.

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The Politics of Paying Physicians: The Determinants of Government Payment Methods in England,Sweden,and the United States

Abstract

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References