CPB Background Document | 1 June 2018
pdf document, 1 MB
Competition and regulation
An important CPB research theme is: what role can the government play for a better functioning of markets?
The concept of 'market' is interpreted in a broad sense, so that also institutional questions concerning public services fall under this heading. Important research topics are: energy, Public and semi-public organisations and health care.
The set of instruments is diverse. Most studies make use of the theory of industrial economics and institutional economics. Because it is often problematic to make a full fledged econometric study, mostly by lack of adequate data, the empiricism is mostly limited to international comparisons, descriptive statistics, interviews and stylized facts. For some topics, such as energy, calibrated simulation models are used.
Conclusions are often based on a creative combination of different theoretical views, empirical sources and common sense. While in itself it is the strength of the research in this sector to work with these limited resources, it is at the same time its weakness, because conclusions cannot always be as strong as desired.
Most recent publications
Does managed competition constrain hospitals’ contract prices? Evidence from the Netherlands
In the Dutch health care system health insurers negotiate with hospitals about the pricing of hospital products in a managed competition framework. In this paper, we study these contract prices that became for the first time publicly available in 2016. The data show substantive price variation between hospitals for the same products, and within a hospital for the same product across insurers.
CPB Discussion Paper 378 | 29 March 2018
24 pages | pdf document, 2.9 MB
Competition and pricing behavior in long term care markets: Evidence from the Market for Assistance in Daily Housekeeping Activities
Exploiting a rich data set on the Dutch market for assistance in daily housekeeping activities (ADHA), we find that larger providers obtain a higher price than do small providers. However, compared to other studies on market power in care markets this price difference is considered small to moderate.
CPB Discussion Paper 373 | 8 February 2018
24 pages | pdf document, 480.6 KB
CPB Policy Brief 2017/12 | 19 December 2017
pdf document, 3 MB
Cheaper and More Haircuts After VAT Cut? Evidence From the Netherlands
We study the effect of the reduction in the VAT rate on services by hairdressers from 17.5 to 6 percent in the Netherlands in January 2000.
CPB Discussion Paper 368 | 22 November 2017
42 pages | pdf document, 1.7 MB