Berkeley Program on Housing and Urban Policy

This paper presents estimates of willingness to pay for medical care, including the quality and intensity of medical treatment sought in response to illness or injury. The empirical analysis is based on some 5000 observations on the behavior of low income households in Ghana in 1986. The results indicate that the decision to seek medical treatment is responsive to household income. Prices have significant but inelastic influences on the choice among types of treatment and the intensity of treatment sought. Availability of treatment has a substantial effect upon the types of treatment and the utilization of facilities. These results are robust to changes in the structure of the estimating model.