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AnnouncementsTHE SOCIAL INSURANCE RESEARCH NETWORK (SIRN), sponsored by the National Academy of Social Insurance (NASI) The Social Insurance Research Network (SIRN), directed by Margaret Simms, President, National Academy of Social Insurance, is an online venue providing access to scholarly research and professional announcements in the Social Insurance community. Social Insurance includes the systems for insuring workers and their families against economic insecurity caused by the loss of income from work and the cost of health care, such as Social Security, Medicare, Workers' Compensation, unemployment insurance, related social assistance and private employee benefits. NASI is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization made up of the nation's leading experts on social insurance. Its mission is to promote understanding and informed policymaking on social insurance and related programs through research, public education, training, and the open exchange of ideas. SIRN is dedicated to increasing communication among social insurance scholars, practitioners, and policy makers throughout the world. | |||||||||||
HEALTH CARE DELIVERY & FINANCING ABSTRACTS"Employee Choice of Flexible Spending Account Participation and Health Plan"
BARTON H. HAMILTON, Washington University, St. Louis - John M. Olin School of Business Despite the fact that flexible spending accounts (FSAs) are becoming an increasingly popular employer-provided health benefit, there has been very little empirical study of FSA use among employees at the individual level. This study contributes to the literature on FSAs through the use of a unique dataset that provides three years of employee-level matched benefits data. Motivated by the theoretical model of FSA choice presented in Cardon and Showalter (2001), we examine the determinants of FSA participation and contribution levels using cross sectional and random effect two part models. FSA participation and health plan choice are also modeled jointly in each year using conditional logit models. We find that, even after controlling for a number of other demographic characteristics, non-whites are less likely to participate in the FSA program, have lower contributions conditional on participation, and have a lower probability of switching to new lower cost share, higher premium plans when they were introduced. We also find evidence that choosing health plans with more expected out-of-pocket expenses is correlated with use of the FSA program. "Can Employers Solve the Adverse Selection Problem for Insurers?"
JAMES MARTON, Georgia State University, Andrew Young School, Department of Economics Establishing the existence of equilibrium in insurance markets has always been a challenging task for economists due to imperfect information. As illustrated by Rothschild and Stiglitz (1976), imperfect information may lead to a complete market failure. This paper extends the standard model of adverse selection by introducing employers that choose the set of policies that are offered to consumers. Introducing employers allows for the existence of multiple pooling and a unique separating equilibrium. The key to these results is that the financial incentives of the insurance companies. Data on age and insurance premiums from the 1987 National Medical Expenditure Survey provides evidence of pooling in the employer-provided health insurance markets. "The Effect of Medicare Coverage for the Disabled on the Market for Private Insurance"
JOHN F. COGAN, Stanford University - The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) Subsidies for health insurance for chronically ill, high-cost individuals may increase coverage in the broader population by improving the functioning of insurance markets. In this paper, we assess an historical example of a policy intervention of this sort, the extension of Medicare to the disabled, on the private insurance coverage of non-disabled individuals. We use data on insurance coverage from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics from before and after the extension of Medicare to the disabled to estimate the effect of the program on private insurance coverage rates in the broader population. We find that the insurance coverage of individuals who had a health condition that limited their ability to work increased significantly in states with high versus low rates of disability. Our findings suggest that that subsidizing individuals with high expected health costs is an effective way to increase the private insurance coverage of other high-cost individuals. | |||||||||||
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Solicitation of Abstracts
This journal publishes abstracts of working papers or papers accepted for publication concerning health insurance, health care financing and delivery systems (including long term care), and health care quality. Papers are invited from a broad range of disciplines and topic areas, and might include papers on Medicare, Medicaid, private health insurance, societal and individual problems resulting from lack of insurance coverage, options for financing and delivering long term care services, issues dealing with prescription drug coverage, systemic and individual quality issues in the U.S. health care system, demographic issues related to the aging of the U.S population, and analyses comparing the U.S. health care system to that of other countries.
Distribution ServicesIf your Institution is interested in learning more about increasing readership for its research by becoming a Partner in Publishing or starting a Research Paper Series, please email: Management@SSRN.com. Distributed by:Advisory BoardHealth Care Delivery & Financing DAVID BLUMENTHAL DANIEL CALLAHAN JUDITH FEDER PAUL B. GINSBURG THEODORE R. MARMOR MARILYN MOON ROSEMARY A. STEVENS JEANETTE TAKAMURA
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