Score contribution per author:
α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count
This paper utilises standard welfare economics to explore a number of assertions that are frequently encountered in connection with the economic rationale of the National Health Service (NHS). It is shown that the NHS‐type of delivery system is likely to produce neither a socially nor medically optimal amount of care, that it is unlikely to achieve consumption equality (even if private practice were to be abolished), that private practice does not enable an optimum to be reached (though some are enabled to make Pareto‐preferred moves) and that non‐price discrimination may systematically discriminate against the poor. A case is also made for the general validity of the choice‐theoretic approach to health care on the grounds that neither demand nor supply is as uniquely determined by technical considerations as is commonly supposed.