In recent years, many health maintenance organizations (HMOs)have exited the market for Medicare managed care; since 1998, the number of participating plans has fallen from 346 to 174. As a result of this reduced participation by HMOs, hundreds of thousands of Medicare beneficiaries have been...

Economics

"This paper investigates the impact of Medicare HMO penetration on the medical care expenditures incurred by Medicare fee-for-service enrollees. We find that increasing penetration leads to reduced health care spending on fee-for-service beneficiaries. In particular, a one percentage point...