The traditional focus of disability research has been on the elderly, with good reason. Chronic disability is much more prevalent among the elderly, and it has a more direct impact on the demand for medical care. It is also important to understand trends in disability among the young, however,...

The traditional focus of disability research has been on the elderly, with good reason. Chronic disability is much more prevalent among the elderly, and it has a more direct impact on the demand for medical care. It is also important to understand trends in disability among the young, however,...

We used claims data from a large U.S. employer that introduced changes in its medical and drug coverage offerings in 2002 for non-Medicare eligible retirees. In addition to the existing plans, the employer introduced two new plans in 2002 that were less generous both in terms of medical and drug...

Many companies have defined-contribution benefit plans requiring employees to pay the full cost (before taxes) of more generous health insurance choices. Research has shown that employee decisions are quite responsive to these arrangements. What is less clear is how the total compensation...

Approximately 100 million elderly will enter Medicare over the next 25 years. We consider the potential benefits of interventions that would reduce or eliminate the most important risk factors for disease and spending. Effective control of hypertension could reduce health care spending $890...

Concern about the effect of aging on long-term care has intensi

Concern about the effect of aging on long-term care has intensi

We analyze the value to the labor force of improvements in survival and health over the years 1970 to 1999. We find that survival gains and reductions in the number of work-days missed due to poor health have added about 8 percent to the remaining labor force value of black males, and about the...

While the fraction of obese people is not as large in Europe as in the United States, obesity is becoming an important issue in Europe as well. Using comparable data from the Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) and the Health and Retirement Study in the U.S. (HRS), we...

While the fraction of obese people is not as large in Europe as in the United States, obesity is becoming an important issue in Europe as well. Using comparable data from the Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) and the Health and Retirement Study in the U.S. (HRS), we...