This paper provides field evidence on (a) how price framing affects consumers' decision to switch health insurance plans and (b) how the price elasticity of demand for health insurance can be influenced by policymakers through simple regulatory efforts. In 2009, in order to foster competition...

To equalize differences in health plan premiums due to differences in risk pools, the German legislature introduced a simple Risk Adjustment Scheme (RAS) based on age, gender and disability status in 1994. In addition, effective 1996, consumers gained the freedom to choose among hundreds of...

Many developing countries have recently increased health insurance coverage at a large scale. While it is commonly believed that this has positive effects, to date, it is not well understood through which channels health insurance coverage contributes to the well-being of individuals. More...

We estimate the effect of the Affordable Care Act Medicaid expansion on county-level mortality in the first four years following expansion. We find a reduction in all-cause mortality in ages 20 to 64 equaling 11.36 deaths per 100,000 individuals, a 3.6 percent decrease. This estimate is largely...

This paper studies how better access to public health insurance affects infant mortality during pandemics. Our analysis combines cross-state variation in mandated eligibility for Medicaid with two influenza pandemics - the 1957-58 "Asian Flu" pandemic and the 1968-69 "Hong Kong Flu" - that...

In this paper, we examine trends in provider fees charged, government expenditure on private out-of-hospital medical services, and out of pocket costs following policy changes intended to reduce government expenditure. We examine the experience of a high-need patient group: people diagnosed with...

We study the effect of health insurance expansion on nutrition-related children's health outcomes. We exploit quasi-random variation from an insurance expansion targeted at poor households in Peru. We find that access to insurance reduces childhood obesity and exerts positive and economically...

The Extended Medicare Safety Net (EMSN) in Australia was designed to provide financial assistance to patients with high out-of-pocket (OOP) costs for medical treatment. The EMSN works on a calendar year basis. Once a patient incurs a specified amount of OOP costs, the EMSN provides additional...