IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/osloec/2003_036.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Low Quality-Effective Demand

Author

Listed:
  • Eika, Kari

    (Dept. of Economics, University of Oslo)

Abstract

Sub-standard quality is a recurrent problem within parts of the human services - in the care for frail elderly, mentally ill, the intellectually disabled, and children in need - and within law enforcement. Service quality is of great concern to the individual, and the larger society. If so important, why then is it so difficult to attain? I address this issue introducing the notion of low quality-effective demand (QED). Low QED is signified either by asymmetric information or weak consumer sovereignty, or a combination. In the standard principal-agent problem the principal may have poor information about the service quality that the agent provides, but has full incentives to monitor. With weak consumer sovereignty the service recipient cannot function as the principal, lacking the ability or the authority to monitor quality. With the U.S. nursing home sector as one particular case, I demonstrate how a better understanding of weak consumer sovereignty and low QED is important to improve the problematic quality of the human services.

Suggested Citation

  • Eika, Kari, 2003. "Low Quality-Effective Demand," Memorandum 36/2003, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:osloec:2003_036
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sv.uio.no/econ/english/research/unpublished-works/working-papers/pdf-files/2003/Memo-36-2003.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alchian, Armen A & Demsetz, Harold, 1972. "Production , Information Costs, and Economic Organization," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 62(5), pages 777-795, December.
    2. Holmstrom, Bengt & Milgrom, Paul, 1991. "Multitask Principal-Agent Analyses: Incentive Contracts, Asset Ownership, and Job Design," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 7(0), pages 24-52, Special I.
    3. Nyman, John A., 1989. "The private demand for nursing home care," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 209-231, June.
    4. Oliver Hart & Andrei Shleifer & Robert W. Vishny, 1997. "The Proper Scope of Government: Theory and an Application to Prisons," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1127-1161.
    5. Nancy Folbre & Julie A. Nelson, 2000. "For Love or Money--Or Both?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 123-140, Fall.
    6. Hirth, Richard A., 1999. "Consumer information and competition between nonprofit and for-profit nursing homes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 219-240, April.
    7. Grabowski, David C. & Hirth, Richard A., 2003. "Competitive spillovers across non-profit and for-profit nursing homes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 1-22, January.
    8. Kenneth J. Arrow, 1996. "Information, Responsibility, and Human Services," NBER Chapters, in: Individual and Social Responsibility: Child Care, Education, Medical Care, and Long-Term Care in America, pages 229-244, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Gertler, Paul J., 1989. "Subsidies, quality, and the regulation of nursing homes," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 33-52, February.
    10. Jenni, Karen E & Loewenstein, George, 1997. "Explaining the "Identifiable Victim Effect."," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 14(3), pages 235-257, May-June.
    11. John A. Nyman, 1988. "Excess Demand, the Percentage of Medicaid Patients, and the Quality of Nursing Home Care," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 23(1), pages 76-92.
    12. Grabowski, David C., 2001. "Medicaid reimbursement and the quality of nursing home care," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 549-569, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Eika, Kari, 2004. "When quality today affects service needs tomorrow," Memorandum 18/2004, Oslo University, Department of Economics.

    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. Jeffrey P. Ballou, 2008. "Do Nonprofit And Government Nursing Homes Enter Unprofitable Markets?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 46(2), pages 241-260, April.
    2. Michael Alexeev & Ivan Dedyukhin & Leonid Polishchuk, 2024. "Ownership, Asymmetric Information, and Quality of Care for the Elderly: Evidence from US Nursing Homes During the COVID-19 Pandemic," CAEPR Working Papers 2024-006 Classification-, Center for Applied Economics and Policy Research, Department of Economics, Indiana University Bloomington.
    3. Chou, Shin-Yi, 2002. "Asymmetric information, ownership and quality of care: an empirical analysis of nursing homes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 293-311, March.
    4. Andrei Shleifer, 1998. "State versus Private Ownership," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 12(4), pages 133-150, Fall.
    5. Shimizutani, Satoshi & Suzuki, Wataru, 2007. "Quality and efficiency of home help elderly care in Japan: Evidence from micro-level data," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 287-301, June.
    6. David C. Grabowski & Edward C. Norton, 2012. "Nursing Home Quality of Care," Chapters, in: Andrew M. Jones (ed.), The Elgar Companion to Health Economics, Second Edition, chapter 29, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    7. Siciliani Luigi, 2013. "The Economics of Long-Term Care," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 14(2), pages 343-375, August.
    8. repec:zbw:rwirep:0470 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Jiao Luo & Aseem Kaul, 2019. "Private action in public interest: The comparative governance of social issues," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(4), pages 476-502, April.
    10. Foster, Andrew D. & Lee, Yong Suk, 2015. "Staffing subsidies and the quality of care in nursing homes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 133-147.
    11. SHIMIZUTANI Satoshi & SUZUKI Wataru, 2002. "The Quality and Efficiency of At-Home Long-term Care in Japan: Evidence from Micro-level Data," ESRI Discussion paper series 018, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    12. Clarissa Yeap, 2006. "Residual Claims and Incentives in Restaurant Chains," Working Papers 06-18, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    13. Cheng, Cheng & Long, Wei, 2018. "Improving police services: Evidence from the French Quarter Task Force," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 1-18.
    14. Haizhen Lin, 2010. "Do Minimum Quality Standards Improve Quality? A Case Study of the Nursing Home Industry," Working Papers 2010-01, Indiana University, Kelley School of Business, Department of Business Economics and Public Policy.
    15. Sean Shenghsiu Huang & John R. Bowblis, 2018. "The principal–agent problem and owner‐managers: An instrumental variables application to nursing home quality," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(11), pages 1653-1669, November.
    16. Haizhen Lin, 2014. "Revisiting the relationship between nurse staffing and quality of care in nursing homes: An instrumental variables approach," Working Papers 2014-01, Indiana University, Kelley School of Business, Department of Business Economics and Public Policy.
    17. Lin, Haizhen, 2014. "Revisiting the relationship between nurse staffing and quality of care in nursing homes: An instrumental variables approach," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 13-24.
    18. Corneo, Giacomo & Rob, Rafael, 2003. "Working in public and private firms," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(7-8), pages 1335-1352, August.
    19. John R. Bowblis & Stephen Crystal & Orna Intrator & Judith A. Lucas, 2012. "Response To Regulatory Stringency: The Case Of Antipsychotic Medication Use In Nursing Homes," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 21(8), pages 977-993, August.
    20. Arndt R. Reichert & Magdalena A. Stroka, 2018. "Nursing home prices and quality of care — Evidence from administrative data," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(1), pages 129-140, January.
    21. Susan F. Lu, 2016. "The Role of Donations in Quality Disclosure: Evidence from Nonprofit Nursing Homes Full Access," American Journal of Health Economics, MIT Press, vol. 2(4), pages 431-462, Fall.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Human services; law enforcement; service quality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • K40 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - General
    • L15 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Information and Product Quality

    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:hhs:osloec:2003_036. 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: Mari Strønstad Øverås (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/souiono.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.