Regional regulators in health care service under quality competition: A game theoretical model

In several countries, healthcare services are provided by public and/or private subjects, and they are reimbursed by the Government, on the basis of regulated prices. Thus, providers take prices as given and compete on quality to attract patients. In some countries, regulated prices differ across regions. This paper focuses on the interdependence between regional regulators within a country: it proposes a model of spatial competition to study how price-setters of different regions interact, in a simple but realistic framework. We show that the decentralisation of price regulation implies higher expenditure, but higher patients' welfare.