• The Journal of the Korean dental association
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• v.54 no.12
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• pp.971-984
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• 2016

The increase rate of dentists' competition is very fast at metropolitan areas in South Korea. We compare metropolitan and rural parameters to investigate the relation between competition and revenue variation. The competition and revenue variables of 73 metropolitan and 75 rural areas were calculated from 2010 Census of Service Industry microdata which include non-insurance revenues of dental clinics. Independent sample t-test results showed that the level of competition among dental clinics in metropolitan areas is higher. The lowest and the low ranked revenues are higher in rural areas. The highest and the average revenues are higher in metropolitan areas. But, 25 percentile and median revenues has no significant difference between two areas. Simple log linear regression results showed that the number of clinics could explain the distribution of revenues in both areas better than the density of active dentists and Herfindahl-Hirschman index. In the areas with many clinics have high maximum and average revenues and low minimum revenues. The increasing rate of maximum revenues is higher in metropolitan areas though the decreasing rate of minimum revenues is higher in rural areas. Metropolitan areas have higher Gini coefficients than rural areas, but the increasing rate of Gini coefficients is lower than rural areas. Findings from this study are useful reference when the dentists select the opening areas. One is that the median revenues between metropolitan and rural areas have no significant difference. The other is that the rural areas ensure the more stable and uniform revenues. The results would help to relieve the consumptive competition among dentists and to achieve the distributional efficiency of dental human resources.