Introduction
Behavioral economics seeks to change the insurance system, considering people’s reactions to changes in certain areas. The goals set, reflecting the interests of the state and society, are to maintain the volume and quality of funded medical care against cost containment. It is a permanent conflict between improving quality and reducing costs. The way out lies in a compromise solution for society and the state, in search of the optimal ratio of efficiency and cost of treatment, in the rational use of resources. Thus, there is one primary task – to achieve a reduction in healthcare costs through the analysis of the behavior of citizens.
Discussion
The goal of state regulation in medical and social security is twofold and, in turn, reflects public interests – high-quality medical care for the population and administrative-economic spending of always scarce funds. The main strategic task of regulation in the field of medical providers is curbing the growth of healthcare costs (Stadhouders et al., 2019). Such a strategic task can be solved through several tactical installations:
- the desire not to pay for expensive methods and means.
- pay only for selected methods and means, that is, the formation of restrictive lists.
- pay for methods and means, but at favorable prices, for which price regulation is applied and reference prices are set.
- pay for treatment not in total but only in part.
- limit the number of people a state has to pay, creating a system of preferential categories of citizens.
Conclusion
The behavior and implications of behavioral economics research permeate every step of cost-benefit containment analysis and influence how policy decisions are made and how the public perceives their consequences. Some logical steps are directly related to predicting future behavior, while others use behavior more indirectly to evaluate non-market outcomes (Chang et al., 2017). In general, surveys show that most people prefer to pay for high-quality services: the current system is only theoretically free, and people have to pay for better treatment one way or another.
References
Chang, L. L., DeVore, A. D., Granger, B. B., Eapen, Z. J., Ariely, D., & Hernandez, A. F. (2017). Leveraging behavioral economics to improve heart failure care and outcomes.Circulation, 136(8), 765–772. Web.
Stadhouders, N., Kruse, F., Tanke, M., Koolman, X., & Jeurissen, P. (2019). Effective healthcare cost-containment policies: A systematic review.Health Policy, 123(1), 71–79. Web.