Nonlinear Rank Scaling and Hidden Structure in NHS Expenditure Transparency Data

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Mohammed, Animotu, Shahtahmassebi, Golnaz, Ribeiro, Haroldo V., Sutton, Jack, Hanley, Quentin S.
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
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author Mohammed, Animotu
Shahtahmassebi, Golnaz
Ribeiro, Haroldo V.
Sutton, Jack
Hanley, Quentin S.
author_facet Mohammed, Animotu
Shahtahmassebi, Golnaz
Ribeiro, Haroldo V.
Sutton, Jack
Hanley, Quentin S.
contents A variety of transparency initiatives have been introduced by governments to reduce corruption and allow citizens to independently evaluate effectiveness and efficiency of spending. In 2010, the UK government mandated transparency for many expenditures exceeding £25,000. The resulting data is dispersed across a range of governmental organizations and presents an opportunity to understand expenditure at scale, interrogate organizational structures and develop transparency measures. Here, we focus on data from the top two layers of the National Health Service (NHS) within England, including NHS England (NHSE) and Integrated Care Boards (ICBs). As the one of the largest government run healthcare organizations in the world and potentially the sixth largest employer globally, the NHS provides a distinctive case for studying healthcare delivery, contractor dynamics, and organizational self-organization. We find that limiting transparency to larger transactions conceals a substantial share of spending from scrutiny, including most transactions. The rank-frequency distributions of suppliers, expense types, and spending categories exhibit multiple scaling regimes and these are similar to patterns observed in word frequency and urban scaling studies.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_19520
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Nonlinear Rank Scaling and Hidden Structure in NHS Expenditure Transparency Data
Mohammed, Animotu
Shahtahmassebi, Golnaz
Ribeiro, Haroldo V.
Sutton, Jack
Hanley, Quentin S.
Applications
A variety of transparency initiatives have been introduced by governments to reduce corruption and allow citizens to independently evaluate effectiveness and efficiency of spending. In 2010, the UK government mandated transparency for many expenditures exceeding £25,000. The resulting data is dispersed across a range of governmental organizations and presents an opportunity to understand expenditure at scale, interrogate organizational structures and develop transparency measures. Here, we focus on data from the top two layers of the National Health Service (NHS) within England, including NHS England (NHSE) and Integrated Care Boards (ICBs). As the one of the largest government run healthcare organizations in the world and potentially the sixth largest employer globally, the NHS provides a distinctive case for studying healthcare delivery, contractor dynamics, and organizational self-organization. We find that limiting transparency to larger transactions conceals a substantial share of spending from scrutiny, including most transactions. The rank-frequency distributions of suppliers, expense types, and spending categories exhibit multiple scaling regimes and these are similar to patterns observed in word frequency and urban scaling studies.
title Nonlinear Rank Scaling and Hidden Structure in NHS Expenditure Transparency Data
topic Applications
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.19520