Comparative Health Care Systems in the European Union

Health care expenditures have become a major issue for governmental policy-making and even governmental stability. Controlling expenditures with at the same time guaranteeing high and fair standards of the provision of health goods is difficult becuase of the complex entanglement of actors, interests and institutional rules. This study intends an encompassing comparison of all components of health care systems in the EU and their impact on the development of expenditures Institutional and organizational economics is the guiding theorietical perspective. Main hypotheses are empirically tested with econometric methods. A sub-project with the title "Institutional structures of European Health Care Systems: an institutional-economic Typology" was granted by the DFG.