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Manipulation and auditing of public sector contracts

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  • Kuhn, Michael
  • Siciliani, Luigi

Abstract

We model purchaser–provider contracts when providers can inflate reimbursable activity through manipulation. Providers are audited and fined upon detected fraud. We characterise the optimal price and audit policy both in the presence and absence of commitment to an audit intensity. Under ‘non-commitment’ the audit intensity increases in reported activity, allowing the provider to soften it by reducing activity together with the underlying service quality and manipulation. The purchaser then faces a trade-off between offsetting this tendency by raising price and committing to a low audit intensity by reducing price. We identify circumstances under which the two forces balance out.

Suggested Citation

  • Kuhn, Michael & Siciliani, Luigi, 2013. "Manipulation and auditing of public sector contracts," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 251-267.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:poleco:v:32:y:2013:i:c:p:251-267
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2013.08.002
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    Cited by:

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    2. Simon B. Spika & Peter Zweifel, 2019. "Buying efficiency: optimal hospital payment in the presence of double upcoding," Health Economics Review, Springer, vol. 9(1), pages 1-14, December.
    3. Giliberto Capano & Michael Howlett, 2020. "The Knowns and Unknowns of Policy Instrument Analysis: Policy Tools and the Current Research Agenda on Policy Mixes," SAGE Open, , vol. 10(1), pages 21582440199, January.
    4. Heike Hennig‐Schmidt & Hendrik Jürges & Daniel Wiesen, 2019. "Dishonesty in health care practice: A behavioral experiment on upcoding in neonatology," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(3), pages 319-338, March.
    5. Martin Chalkley & Budi Hidayat & Royasia Viki Ramadani & María José Aragón, 2022. "The sensitivity of hospital coding to prices: evidence from Indonesia," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 147-162, June.
    6. Pedro Barros & Gisele Braun, 2017. "Upcoding in a National Health Service: the evidence from Portugal," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(5), pages 600-618, May.
    7. Domenico Lisi & Luigi Siciliani & Odd Rune Straume, 2020. "Hospital competition under pay‐for‐performance: Quality, mortality, and readmissions," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(2), pages 289-314, April.
    8. De Luca, Giacomo & Lisi, Domenico & Martorana, Marco & Siciliani, Luigi, 2021. "Does higher Institutional Quality improve the Appropriateness of Healthcare Provision?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    9. Jurgita Januleviciute & Jan Erik Askildsen & Oddvar Kaarboe & Luigi Siciliani & Matt Sutton, 2016. "How do Hospitals Respond to Price Changes? Evidence from Norway," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(5), pages 620-636, May.
    10. François Maréchal & Lionel Thomas, 2021. "The impact of medical complications on optimal hospital payment," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 23(6), pages 1144-1173, December.
    11. Luigi Siciliani & James Gaughan & Nils Gutacker & Hugh Gravelle & Martin Chalkley, 2021. "Paying for health gains," Working Papers 183cherp, Centre for Health Economics, University of York.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Auditing; Commitment; Fraud; Moral hazard; Public-sector contracting;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • L51 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Economics of Regulation

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