We examine whether unregulated, private insurance markets efficiently provide insurance against reclassification risk (the risk of becoming a bad risk and facing higher premiums). To do so, we examine the ex-post risk type of individuals who drop their long-term care insurance contracts relative...

Much of the extensive empirical literature on insurance markets hasfocused on whether adverse selection can be detected. Once detected, however, therehas been little attempt to quantify its welfare cost, or to assess whether and whatpotential government interventions may reduce these costs. To...

"Standard theories of insurance, dating from Rothschild and Stiglitz (1976), stress the role of adverse selection in explaining the decision to purchase insurance. In these models, higher risk people buy full or near-full insurance, while lower risk people buy less complete coverage, if they buy...