essays in public finance and industrial organization a dissertation ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 11 Prediction 2. Holding overall wealth constant, the willingness to pay for insurance v—and therefore insurance coverage—is increasing in the level of seizable assets w S . Because the implicit insurance from bankruptcy is a substitute for conventional health insurance, households with more seizable assets have a higher willingness to pay for insurance and are ceteris paribus more likely to be insured. I derive the prediction in Appendix Section 1.10.1. The prediction is robust to natural extensions of the model. For example, allowing insured households to receive more or better medical treatment (?) increases the incentive to purchase coverage, but households with fewer seizable assets are still relatively less likely to insure. Similarly, increasing the cost of bankruptcy to account for factors such as stigma (?) or reduced future access to credit (?) does not affect the basic prediction. And endogenizing the level of seizable and exempt assets actually strengthens the relationship between insurance coverage and seizable assets because households that choose to forgo coverage have an additional incentive to reduce their seizable asset holdings. A more subtle point relates to the information available to households. The model assumes that households know their level of seizable assets w S and their health risk. Obviously this is an exaggeration. What matters is that households have some knowl- edge of the financial risk from forgoing insurance. For example, if households learn from the news-media or peers that medical providers in their community frequently seize home equity, then homeowners may be more likely to purchase coverage—even if they know nothing about the mechanism. 1.3 Data Overview I use two main data sources to test the predictions of the model. I examine the effect of bankruptcy on medical costs using data from the 2000 to 2005 waves of the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS). The survey has detailed information on medical costs and insurance coverage. At the Data Center, encrypted state identifiers and
CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 12 newly edited asset and debt variables are also available. 17 I examine the effects on coverage using the MEPS data and the 1999 to 2005 waves of the biennial Panel Survey of Income Dynamics (PSID). The survey has public use information on insurance coverage, assets and debts variables, and state identifiers. Because the state of residence is non-encrypted in the PSID, I use this dataset for the primary insurance coverage analysis and replicate the results in the MEPS. In both data sets, I aggregate the individual-level data to the household level and inflation-adjust monetary variables to 2005 dollars using the CPI-U. I also exclude households with one or more members enrolled in public insurance or a head age 65 or older due to their eligibility for public Medicare insurance. 18 This leaves me with 34,841 observations in the MEPS and 22,844 observations in the PSID. 1.3.1 Asset Exemptions I codify assets exemptions using ?, a do-it-yourself guide to personal bankruptcy. Table 1.1 shows these exemptions. Contemporaneous homestead exemptions exhibit substantial variation, ranging from zero in seven states to unlimited in eight others; vehicle exemptions range from zero in 15 states to at least $10,000 in five others; and wildcard exemptions, which can be applied to any asset, show a similar degree of variation. California residents can file under two different exemption systems, and residents of 14 states can file under the federal exemption system if they choose. The last column shows homestead exemptions in the year of 1920 from ?. 19 1.3.2 Seizable Assets Let i denote households and j denoted states. Seizable assets are a function of household assets and debts and exemptions laws, denoted by vectors wi and ej. Following the general structure of ?, seizable asset can be decomposed into assets that can be 17 ? find that the estimates of net worth in the MEPS are comparable to those in the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). My analysis does not go back before 2000 because when I started the project only asset and debt data from the 2000 to 2005 period had been edited. 18 In the MEPS, I also drop the 3.6 percent of households with missing wealth variables. 19 States that did not exist and states that had only acre-based exemptions are denoted as missing.
Page 1 and 2: ESSAYS IN PUBLIC FINANCE AND INDUST
Page 3 and 4: I certify that I have read this dis
Page 5 and 6: insurance choice. Among other thing
Page 7 and 8: Acknowledgements I am deeply thankf
Page 9 and 10: Contents Preface iv Acknowledgement
Page 11 and 12: 2.5.3 The Value of Plan Choice ....
Page 13 and 14: List of Tables 1.1 Asset Exemption
Page 15 and 16: 4.9 First Week Contract Spending fo
Page 17 and 18: 4.3 I.T. Contracting by Week ......
Page 19 and 20: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 2 of the dead
Page 21 and 22: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 4 relevant le
Page 23 and 24: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 6 superficial
Page 25: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 8 After treat
Page 32: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 15 bound of t
Page 37 and 38: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 20 or coverag
Page 39 and 40: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 22 homestead
Page 41 and 42: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 24 log seizab
Page 43 and 44: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 26 on the bas
Page 45 and 46: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 28 to seizabl
Page 48 and 49: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 31 CARA utili
Page 50 and 51: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 33 Puzzle 3:
Page 52: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 35 of income
Page 57 and 58: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 40 TaxSim pro
Page 59 and 60: Payments CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 42 $
Page 61 and 62: OOP payments CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY
Page 63 and 64: ln(seizable sssets) CHAPTER 1. BANK
Page 65 and 66: 50 60 70 80 90 100 Insurance covera
Page 67 and 68: Pr(WTP > premium) CHAPTER 1. BANKRU
Page 69 and 70: CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 52 Table 1.1:
Page 77 and 78:
CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 60 Table 1.9:
Page 79 and 80:
CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 62 Table 1.11
Page 81 and 82:
CHAPTER 1. BANKRUPTCY 64 Table 1.14
Page 83 and 84:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 66 pl
Page 85 and 86:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 68 ar
Page 87:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 70 pl
Page 90 and 91:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 73 va
Page 92 and 93:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 75 An
Page 94 and 95:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 77 2.
Page 98 and 99:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 81 wh
Page 100 and 101:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 83 cr
Page 105 and 106:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 88 2.
Page 107 and 108:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 90 av
Page 109 and 110:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 92 ar
Page 111 and 112:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 94 le
Page 113 and 114:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 96
Page 115 and 116:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 98 ef
Page 117 and 118:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 100 2
Page 119 and 120:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 102 T
Page 121:
Page 124 and 125:
Page 126 and 127:
Page 128 and 129:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 111 F
Page 130 and 131:
CHAPTER 2. HEALTH PLAN CHOICE 113 6
Page 134 and 135:
Chapter 3 Private Coverage and Publ
Page 136 and 137:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 119 be of intere
Page 138 and 139:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 121 hazard for i
Page 140 and 141:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 123 have benefit
Page 145 and 146:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 128 We use boots
Page 147 and 148:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 130 of costs and
Page 149 and 150:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 132 policy that
Page 151 and 152:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 134 3.6.2 Causal
Page 153 and 154:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 136 3.6.3 Robust
Page 155 and 156:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 138 calculated u
Page 157 and 158:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 140 (10000,11000
Page 159 and 160:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 142 Table 3.2: S
Page 161 and 162:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 144 Table 3.4: H
Page 163 and 164:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 146 Table 3.6: S
Page 165 and 166:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 148 Table 3.8: R
Page 167 and 168:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 150 Table 3.10:
Page 169 and 170:
CHAPTER 3. MEDIGAP 152 Table 3.12:
Page 171 and 172:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 154 bu
Page 173 and 174:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 156 in
Page 176:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 159 To
Page 180 and 181:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 163 4.
Page 182 and 183:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 165 or
Page 184 and 185:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 167 ha
Page 186 and 187:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 169 It
Page 189:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 172 To
Page 192 and 193:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 175 0.
Page 194 and 195:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 177 Th
Page 196 and 197:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 179 to
Page 198 and 199:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 181 Co
Page 200 and 201:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 183 Fi
Page 202 and 203:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 185 Sp
Page 204 and 205:
CHAPTER 4. YEAR-END SPENDING 187 Ta
Page 206 and 207:
Page 208 and 209:
Page 210 and 211:
Page 212 and 213:
Page 214 and 215:
show all

essays in public finance and industrial organization a dissertation ...

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?