Alternative government policies for general practitioner location: Information, prices and incomes

The Commonwealth Government has recently implemented a scheme which involves financial incentives for general practitioners to relocate from urban areas to rural/ remote areas of Australia. The purpose of this scheme is to redress differential provision and utilisation of general practice services across space. This paper describes systematic differences in the prices and quantities of general practitioner services and general practitioner incomes provided in different regions of the State of Queensland for 1991-92. More specifically, it is found that prices and incomes are higher in more remote regions of the state. The paper concludes with a consideration of an alternative policy, i.e. relocation could be effected by the dissemination of information on the regional differences in prices and incomes. © 1995, Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. All rights reserved.