C) the tendency of people to be unwilling to sell something they already own even if
they are offered a price that is greater than the price they would be willing to pay to buy
the good if they didn’t already own it.
D) the tendency of firms to use celebrities endowed with good looks to promote their
products
Article Summary. Administrative overhead costs resulting from insurance
companies handling reimbursement claims is in large part the reason that health
care in the United States is much more expensive than in other countries. An
analysis on the administration costs of health care in the United States found that
roughly 30 percent of the costs of health care are administrative and that more
than 25 percent of health-sector employees work in administration. Health
insurance companies are often paid a fixed percentage of the claims they
administer, which gives them little to no impetus to increase efficiency and keep
costs down.
Source: Jeffrey Pfeffer, “The Reason Health Care Is So Expensive: Insurance
Companies,” Bloomberg Businessweek, April 10, 2013.
Even if insurance companies were more efficient and brought administrative costs
down, consumers would still pay less than the full cost of medical treatment. This
would result in the market equilibrium price of medical services being ________ than
the efficient equilibrium price, and the market equilibrium quantity of medical services
being ________ than the efficient equilibrium quantity.
A) greater; greater
B) greater; less
C) less; greater
D) less; less