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University of Michigan Law School

Health Law and Policy

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

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Full-Text Articles in Law

What Do Nonprofits Maximize? Hospital Service Provision And Market Ownership Mix, Jill R. Horwitz, Austin Nichols Jul 2007

What Do Nonprofits Maximize? Hospital Service Provision And Market Ownership Mix, Jill R. Horwitz, Austin Nichols

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

Conflicting theories of the nonprofit firm have existed for several decades yet empirical research has not resolved these debates, partly because the theories are not easily testable but also because empirical research generally considers organizations in isolation rather than in markets. Here we examine three types of hospitals – nonprofit, for-profit, and government – and their spillover effects. We look at the effect of for-profit ownership share within markets in two ways, on the provision of medical services and on operating margins at the three types of hospitals. We find that nonprofit hospitals’ medical service provision systematically varies by market …


Why We Need The Independent Sector: The Behavior, Law, & Ethics Of Not-For-Profit Hospitals, Jill R. Horwitz Jan 2004

Why We Need The Independent Sector: The Behavior, Law, & Ethics Of Not-For-Profit Hospitals, Jill R. Horwitz

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

Among the major forms of corporate ownership, the not-for-profit ownership form is distinct in its behavior, legal constraints, and moral obligations. A new empirical analysis of the American hospital industry, using eleven years of data for all urban general hospitals in the country, shows that corporate form accounts for large differences in the provision of specific medical services. Not-for-profit hospitals systematically provide both private and public goods that are in the public interest, and that other forms fail to provide. Two hypotheses are proposed to account for the findings, one legal and one moral. While no causal claims are made, …


Following The Man On The Clapham Omnibus: Social Science Evidence In Malpractice Litigation, Richard O. Lempert Jul 2003

Following The Man On The Clapham Omnibus: Social Science Evidence In Malpractice Litigation, Richard O. Lempert

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

This article responds to proposals to admit statistical evidence from empirical studies of actual health care practices to prove prevailing health practice standards in malpractice litigation by arguing that the case for doing so has numerous weaknesses that advocates of admitting such data commonly ignore. A fundamental concern is that the standard of practice defense co-evolved with prevailing modes of proof and might have been different had proof through experts not allowed for an aspirational as well as an empirical element to reach the jury. The article also argues that generating reliable statistical evidence of standard medical practice can be …