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Transparency and Negotiated Prices: The Value of Information in Hospital-Supplier Bargaining

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  • Matthew Grennan
  • Ashley Swanson
Abstract
Using data on hospitals’ purchases across a large number of important product categories, we find that access to information on purchasing by peer hospitals leads to reductions in the prices hospitals negotiate for supplies. These effects are concentrated among hospitals previously paying relatively high prices for brands purchased in large volumes. Evidence from coronary stents suggests that transparency allows hospitals to resolve asymmetric information problems, but savings are limited in part by the stickiness of contracts in business-to-business settings. Savings are largest for physician preference items, where high-price, high-quantity hospital-brand combinations average 3.9% savings, versus 1.6% for commodities.

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  • Matthew Grennan & Ashley Swanson, 2020. "Transparency and Negotiated Prices: The Value of Information in Hospital-Supplier Bargaining," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(4), pages 1234-1268.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jpolec:doi:10.1086/705329
    DOI: 10.1086/705329
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    Cited by:

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    2. Martin Gaynor & Kate Ho & Robert J. Town, 2015. "The Industrial Organization of Health-Care Markets," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 53(2), pages 235-284, June.
    3. Itai Ater & Oren Rigbi, 2018. "The Effects of Mandatory Disclosure of Supermarket Prices," CESifo Working Paper Series 6942, CESifo.
    4. Montag, Felix & Sagimuldina, Alina & Winter, Christoph, 2024. "When does mandatory price disclosure lower prices? Evidence from the German fuel market," Working Papers 344, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.
    5. Stuart V. Craig & Matthew Grennan & Ashley Swanson, 2021. "Mergers and marginal costs: New evidence on hospital buyer power," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 52(1), pages 151-178, March.
    6. Abe Dunn & Joshua D Gottlieb & Adam Hale Shapiro & Daniel J Sonnenstuhl & Pietro Tebaldi, 2024. "A Denial a Day Keeps the Doctor Away," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 139(1), pages 187-233.
    7. Matthew Backus & Thomas Blakee & Brad Larsen & Steven Tadelis, 2020. "Sequential Bargaining in the Field: Evidence from Millions of Online Bargaining Interactions," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(3), pages 1319-1361.
    8. Clark, Robert & Coviello, Decio & de Leverano, Adriano, 2021. "Centralized procurement and delivery times: Evidence from a natural experiment in Italy," ZEW Discussion Papers 21-063, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    9. Olivier Bochet & Manshu Khanna & Simon Siegenthaler, 2024. "Beyond Dividing the Pie: Multi-Issue Bargaining in the Laboratory," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 91(1), pages 163-191.
    10. David P Byrne & Leslie A Martin & Jia Sheen Nah, 2022. "Price Discrimination by Negotiation: a Field Experiment in Retail Electricity [“Redistribution through Markets,”]," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 137(4), pages 2499-2537.
    11. Martinez-Carrasco, José & ConceiçaÞo, Otavio & Dezolt, Ana Lúcia, 2023. "More Information, Lower Price? Access Market-based Reference Prices and Gains in Public Procurement Efficiency," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 12754, Inter-American Development Bank.
    12. de Leverano, Adriano & Baulia, Susmita, 2023. "A new indicator to implement effective spending review policies in the public procurement for standardized goods," ZEW Discussion Papers 23-063, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    13. Sorabh Tomar, 2023. "Greenhouse Gas Disclosure and Emissions Benchmarking," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 61(2), pages 451-492, May.
    14. David P Byrne & Leslie A Martin & Jia Sheen Nah, 2023. "Price Discrimination by Negotiation: a Field Experiment in Retail Electricity," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 137(4), pages 2499-2537.
    15. Kjellberg, Hans & Sjögren, Ebba & Krafve, Linus Johansson, 2023. "The functions of known to be inaccurate prices in markets: A cross-country comparison of pharmaceutical list pricing," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 167(C).
    16. Jeffrey Clemens & Joshua D. Gottlieb & Tímea Laura Molnár, 2015. "The Anatomy of Physician Payments: Contracting Subject to Complexity," NBER Working Papers 21642, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. De Leverano, Adriano & Coviello, Decio & Clark, Robert, 2023. "Centralized Procurement and Delivery Times: Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Italy," VfS Annual Conference 2023 (Regensburg): Growth and the "sociale Frage" 277589, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    18. Clarissa Lotti & Giancarlo Spagnolo, 2022. "Indirect Savings from Public Procurement Centralization," CEIS Research Paper 532, Tor Vergata University, CEIS, revised 01 Feb 2022.
    19. Jiarui Liu, 2021. "Sequential Search Models: A Pairwise Maximum Rank Approach," Papers 2104.13865, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2021.
    20. Stephen McCarthy & Damien Sheehan‐Connor, 2022. "The effect of hospital‐physician integration on hospital costs," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(11), pages 2333-2368, November.
    21. Aidan R. Vining, 2016. "What Is Public Agency Strategic Analysis (PASA) and How Does It Differ from Public Policy Analysis and Firm Strategy Analysis?," Administrative Sciences, MDPI, vol. 6(4), pages 1-31, December.
    22. Riccaboni, Massimo & Swoboda, Torben & Van Dyck, Walter, 2022. "Pharmaceutical net price transparency across european markets: Insights from a multi-agent simulation model," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(6), pages 534-540.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D40 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - General
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
    • I11 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Analysis of Health Care Markets
    • L14 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Transactional Relationships; Contracts and Reputation

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