IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jlawec/v38y1995i2p437-61.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Nonprofit Hospital Mergers and the Exercise of Market Power

Author

Listed:
  • Lynk, William J

Abstract

Government challenges to mergers within the hospital industry have become more frequent. Many of those mergers involve nonprofit organizations rather than the for-profit firms that are the norm in most other industries. This difference in ownership has made no apparent difference in the antitrust agencies' approach to proposed hospital mergers. In this article I test the proposition that nonprofit and for-profit hospitals price differently in response to the structure of the markets in which they compete. Based on a cross-sectional analysis of California hospitals, I find that estimated merger effects on hospital prices do vary by type of ownership. In response to either higher market share or to the joint combination of higher share and higher market concentration, private nonprofit hospital prices are statistically significantly lower than for-profit hospital prices, and on balance in this sample there is no evidence of any systematic price-increasing effect on private nonprofit hospitals. Copyright 1995 by the University of Chicago.

Suggested Citation

  • Lynk, William J, 1995. "Nonprofit Hospital Mergers and the Exercise of Market Power," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 38(2), pages 437-461, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlawec:v:38:y:1995:i:2:p:437-61
    DOI: 10.1086/467338
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/467338
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/467338?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Richard G. Frank & David S. Salkever, 1991. "The Supply of Charity Services by Nonprofit Hospitals: Motives and Market Structure," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 22(3), pages 430-445, Autumn.
    2. Lynk, William J., 1995. "The creation of economic efficiencies in hospital mergers," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(5), pages 507-530, December.
    3. Hansmann, Henry, 1988. "Ownership of the Firm," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 4(2), pages 267-304, Fall.
    4. Ravenscraft, David J, 1983. "Structure-Profit Relationships at the Line of Business and Industry Level," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 65(1), pages 22-31, February.
    5. Dranove, David & Shanley, Mark & White, William D, 1993. "Price and Concentration in Hospital Markets: The Switch from Patient-Driven to Payer-Driven Competition," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(1), pages 179-204, April.
    6. Becker, Edmund R & Sloan, Frank A, 1985. "Hospital Ownership and Performance," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 23(1), pages 21-36, January.
    7. Hansmann, Henry, 1985. "The Organization of Insurance Companies: Mutual versus Stock," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 125-153, Spring.
    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. Krishnan, Ranjani, 2001. "Market restructuring and pricing in the hospital industry," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 213-237, March.
    2. Gaynor, Martin & Vogt, William B., 2000. "Antitrust and competition in health care markets," Handbook of Health Economics, in: A. J. Culyer & J. P. Newhouse (ed.), Handbook of Health Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 27, pages 1405-1487, Elsevier.
    3. Keeler, Emmett B. & Melnick, Glenn & Zwanziger, Jack, 1999. "The changing effects of competition on non-profit and for-profit hospital pricing behavior," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 69-86, January.
    4. Fabrice Roth, 2000. "Gouvernement des entreprises et stratégie du dirigeant:une étude clinique dans le secteur de l'assurance," Working Papers CREGO 1000701, Université de Bourgogne - CREGO EA7317 Centre de recherches en gestion des organisations.
    5. Paul Gertler & Jennifer Kuan, 2009. "Does It Matter Who Your Buyer Is? The Role of Nonprofit Mission in the Market for Corporate Control of Hospitals," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 52(2), pages 295-306, May.
    6. Dranove, David & White, William D, 1994. "Recent Theory and Evidence on Competition in Hospital Markets," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(1), pages 169-209, Spring.
    7. Galina Besstremyannaya, 2015. "Heterogeneous effect of residency matching and prospective payment on labor returns and hospital scale economies," Discussion Papers 15-001, Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
    8. Martin Gaynor & Deborah Haas-Wilson, 1999. "Change, Consolidation, and Competition in Health Care Markets," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 13(1), pages 141-164, Winter.
    9. Peter Zaleski & Alfredo Esposto, 2007. "The Response to Market Power: Non-Profit Hospitals versus For-Profit Hospitals," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 35(3), pages 315-325, September.
    10. Robert Connor & Roger Feldman & Bryan Dowd, 1998. "The Effects of Market Concentration and Horizontal Mergers on Hospital Costs and Prices," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(2), pages 159-180.
    11. Gary M. Fournier, 2014. "Can Empirical Demand Models Assist in CON Comparative Reviews? A Case Study in Florida," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 81(1), pages 68-90, July.
    12. Krishnan, Ranjani A. & Krishnan, Hema, 2003. "Effects of hospital mergers and acquisitions on prices," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 56(8), pages 647-656, August.
    13. Sujoy Chakravarty & Martin Gaynor & Steven Klepper & William B. Vogt, 2006. "Does the profit motive make Jack nimble? Ownership form and the evolution of the US hospital industry," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(4), pages 345-361, April.
    14. Jonathan Gruber, 1992. "The Effect of Price Shopping in Medical Markets: Hospital Responses to PPOs in California," NBER Working Papers 4190, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Elliott, Matthew & James, Harvey Jr., 2013. "Nature Of The Farm: Revisited," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 150726, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    16. Tortia, Ermanno, 2014. "L'impresa come bene comune," AICCON Working Papers 131-2013, Associazione Italiana per la Cultura della Cooperazione e del Non Profit.
    17. Boone, J., 2004. "Balance of Power," Other publications TiSEM d3f8cd4b-eaf0-4c1c-aed4-5, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    18. Pan, Jay & Qin, Xuezheng & Li, Qian & Messina, Joseph P. & Delamater, Paul L., 2015. "Does hospital competition improve health care delivery in China?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 179-199.
    19. Régis Coeurderoy & Rodolphe Durand, 2001. "La cohérence des choix stratégiques:l'impact des décisions d'entrée et des stratégies génériques sur la performance organisationnelle des firmes," Revue Finance Contrôle Stratégie, revues.org, vol. 4(3), pages 57-88, September.
    20. Micha Gisser & Raymond Sauer, 2000. "The Aggregate Relation between Profits and Concentration is Consistent with Cournot Behavior," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 16(3), pages 229-246, May.

    More about this item

    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:ucp:jlawec:v:38:y:1995:i:2:p:437-61. 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: Journals Division (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JLE .

    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.