Will increased wages increase nurses' working hours in the health care sector?

Many registered nurses (RNs) in Norway work part-time, or in non-health jobs. The nurses’ trade organizations claim that a wage increase will increase the short-term labor supply in health care. This paper is an attempt to identify the effects of job-type specific wage increases through policy simulations on micro data. The individual’s labor supply decision can be considered as a choice from a set of discrete alternatives (job packages). These job packages are characterized by attributes such as hours of work, sector specific wages and other sector specific aspects of the jobs. The unique data set covers all RNs registered in Norway and their families. The spouses’ incomes and age of the children are vital when estimating the labor supply of this profession. For married females the results indicate job type specific wage elasticities for hours of work of 0.17 in hospitals and 0.39 in primary care. The total hours worked in health and non-health jobs are actually predicted to be slightly reduced, but the change is not significantly different from zero. Single females are somewhat more responsive to wage changes than married ones.Registered nurses; discrete choice; non-convex budget sets; labor supply; sector-specific wages

A Discrete Choice Analysis of Norwegian Physicians’ Labor Supply and Sector Choice

What is the effect of increased wages on physician’s working hours and sector choice? This study applies an econometric framework that allows for non-convex budget sets, nonlinear labor supply curves and imperfect markets with institutional constraints. The physicians are assumed to make choices from a finite set of job possibilities, characterized by practice form, hours and wage rates. The individuals may combine their main position with an extra job, opening for a variety of combinations of hours in the respective jobs. I take into account the complicated payment schemes for physicians, taxes and household characteristics when estimating labor supply on Norwegian micro data. The results show a modest response in total hours to a wage increase, but a reallocation of hours in favor of the sector with increased wages.Physicians; discrete choice; labor supply

Compensating differentials for nurses

When entering the job market registered nurses (RNs) face job alternatives with differences in wages and other job attributes. Previous studies of the nursing labor market have shown large earnings differences between similar hospital and non-hospital RNs. Corresponding differences are found in some of the analyses of shift and regular daytime workers. In the first part of this paper I analyze the wage differentials in the Norwegian public health sector, applying a switching regression model. I find no hospital premium for the shift RNs and a slightly negative hospital premium for the daytime RNs, but it is not significant for the hospital job choice. I find a positive shift premium. The wage rate is 19% higher for the shift working hospital RNs and 18% for the sample of primary care workers. The shift premium is only weakly significant for the shift work choice for the sample of hospital RNs, and not for the primary care RNs. I identify some selection effects. In the second part of the paper I focus on the shift compensation only, and present a structural labor supply model with a random utility function. This is done to identify the expected compensating variation necessary for the nurses to remain on the same utility level when they are “forced” from a day job to a shift job. The expected compensating variations are derived by Monte Carlo simulations and presented for different categories of hours. I find that on average the offered combination of higher wages, shorter working hours and increased flexibility overcompensates for the health and social strains related to shift work.Registered nurses; compensating variations; switching regression; random utility models; discrete choice; shift work; labor supply

Keynesian economics and the Oslo School

The economic crisis of the 1930’s hit Norway when Ragnar Frisch returned from the US to accept a professorship at University of Oslo. On his return he wrote newspaper articles proposing tax relief and monetary policies to fight the economic crisis. Frisch abandoned his monetary policies and developed his Oslo School emphasising mathematical models, econometrics, national accounts, and detailed state governance. For the next four decades this School dominated economic policy in Norway where market forces had been substituted with administrative decision making. Keynes, with his General Theory, pointed out that a market economy with an active government can secure full employment. When the ideas of the Oslo School were challenged at the end of the 1970’s, by academics and through the poor performance of the economy, it collapsed. A decentralised market economy was reintroduced and The Keynesian paradigm emerged as the preferred theory compared to the approach of the Oslo School.

Private health care as a supplement to a public health system with waiting time for treatment

In this article the authors Michael Hoel and Erik Magnus Sæther consider an economy where most of the health care is publicly provided, and where there is waiting time for several types of treatments. Private health care without waiting time is an option for the patients in the public health queue. This article shows the effects of a tax (positive or negative) on private health care, and derives the socially optimal tax/subsidy. Finally, a discussion of how the size of the tax might affect the political support for a high quality public health system is provided.Private health care; public health care; health queues

Public Health Care with Waiting Time: The Role of Supplementary Private Health Care

We consider an economy where most of the health care is publicly provided,and where there is waiting time for several types of treatments. Privatehealth care without waiting time is an option for the patients in the publichealth queue. We show that although patients with low waiting costs willchoose public treatment, they may be better off with waiting time thanwithout. The reason is that waiting time induces patients with high waitingcosts to choose private treatment, thus reducing the cost of public healthcare that everyone pays for. Even if higher quality (i.e. zero waiting time) canbe achieved at no cost, the self-selection induced redistribution may implythat it is socially optimal to provide health care publicly and at an inferiorquality level. We give a detailed discussion of the circumstances in which it isoptimal to have waiting time for public health treatment. Moreover, we studythe interaction between this quality decision and the optimal tax/subsidy onprivate health care.public health care, private health care, waiting time, healthqueues.

Solving MaxSAT and #SAT on structured CNF formulas

In this paper we propose a structural parameter of CNF formulas and use it to identify instances of weighted MaxSAT and #SAT that can be solved in polynomial time. Given a CNF formula we say that a set of clauses is precisely satisfiable if there is some complete assignment satisfying these clauses only. Let the ps-value of the formula be the number of precisely satisfiable sets of clauses. Applying the notion of branch decompositions to CNF formulas and using ps-value as cut function, we define the ps-width of a formula. For a formula given with a decomposition of polynomial ps-width we show dynamic programming algorithms solving weighted MaxSAT and #SAT in polynomial time. Combining with results of 'Belmonte and Vatshelle, Graph classes with structured neighborhoods and algorithmic applications, Theor. Comput. Sci. 511: 54-65 (2013)' we get polynomial-time algorithms solving weighted MaxSAT and #SAT for some classes of structured CNF formulas. For example, we get $O(m^2(m + n)s)$ algorithms for formulas $F$ of $m$ clauses and $n$ variables and size $s$, if $F$ has a linear ordering of the variables and clauses such that for any variable $x$ occurring in clause $C$, if $x$ appears before $C$ then any variable between them also occurs in $C$, and if $C$ appears before $x$ then $x$ occurs also in any clause between them. Note that the class of incidence graphs of such formulas do not have bounded clique-width

Maximum matching width: new characterizations and a fast algorithm for dominating set

We give alternative definitions for maximum matching width, e.g. a graph $G$ has $\operatorname{mmw}(G) \leq k$ if and only if it is a subgraph of a chordal graph $H$ and for every maximal clique $X$ of $H$ there exists $A,B,C \subseteq X$ with $A \cup B \cup C=X$ and $|A|,|B|,|C| \leq k$ such that any subset of $X$ that is a minimal separator of $H$ is a subset of either $A, B$ or $C$. Treewidth and branchwidth have alternative definitions through intersections of subtrees, where treewidth focuses on nodes and branchwidth focuses on edges. We show that mm-width combines both aspects, focusing on nodes and on edges. Based on this we prove that given a graph $G$ and a branch decomposition of mm-width $k$ we can solve Dominating Set in time $O^*({8^k})$, thereby beating $O^*(3^{\operatorname{tw}(G)})$ whenever $\operatorname{tw}(G) > \log_3{8} \times k \approx 1.893 k$. Note that $\operatorname{mmw}(G) \leq \operatorname{tw}(G)+1 \leq 3 \operatorname{mmw}(G)$ and these inequalities are tight. Given only the graph $G$ and using the best known algorithms to find decompositions, maximum matching width will be better for solving Dominating Set whenever $\operatorname{tw}(G) > 1.549 \times \operatorname{mmw}(G)$