Excessive waiting times in government facilities

When government facilities cannot meet demand effectively, institutions resort to rationing by queue. Not only is time wasted, but services can be unintentionally and inefficiently rationed, because people with relatively minor ailments, in the case of medical facilities, are induced to use health facilities more often when the health facilities are subsidized.

In the case of health care, this means long waiting times in government facilities: up to eight hours in Nigeria and five hours in Uganda. In 1993 it was estimated that the average Italian spends up to 20 days per year in queues in government facilities.