The cost of health care is increasing at a rate higher thaninflation. One popular suggestion by policy makers to lower therate of this cost increase is to (i) rely more heavily on nursepractitioners instead of primary care doctors for certain medicaltreatments and (ii) to lower the average time patients stay in thehospital and to take care of them at home as soon as possible (inmedical lingo this is substituting \"outpatient care\" for \"inpatientcare\"). What does this imply about the \"production function\" ofhealth care as a function of labor of doctors and nurses?
