Abstract
It has been traditionally argued that short-term private hospitals in the United States are predominantly non-profit voluntary institutions because they owe their origins to the charitable hospital of the nineteenth century, because they enjoy tax and other advantages over profit-making hospitals, and because Americans abhor the idea of profiting at the expense of the sick.
Though all three arguments contribute to an explanation, they are incomplete. The charitable tradition and the abhorrence of profit-making explain why non-profit hospitals have been granted tax exemption and other legal advantages. But what incentive is there to accept these advantages if the condition attached to them is that profit, including the profit flowing from the advantages, must be forgone? It is argued that the profits of a physician-owner come partly in the form of service provided by the hospital, and that the proportion of profit taken in this form grows as the size of the hospital and its medical staff grow. Thus, the non-profit hospital is preferred to the profit-making hospital because, paradoxically, it is the more profitable form.
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References
Arrow, Kenneth, ‘Uncertainty and the Welfare Economics of Medical Care’, American Economic Review (1963).
Steinwald, Bruce, and Neuhauser, Duncan, ‘The Role of the Proprietary Hospital’, Law and Contemporary Problems (1970).
Data Sources
American Dental Association, Distributions of Dentists in the United States by State, Region, District, and County (Chicago, 1972).
American Hospitals Association, Journal of the American Hospital Association, various issues.
American Medical Association, Distribution of Physicians in the United States, 1970 (Chicago, 1971).
U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Income of Physicians, Osteopaths, and Dentists from Professional Practice, 1965–69 (Washington, D.C., 1972).
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© 1974 The International Economic Association
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Rosett, R.N. (1974). Proprietary Hospitals in the United States. In: Perlman, M. (eds) The Economics of Health and Medical Care. International Economic Association Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-63660-0_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-63660-0_4
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