nep-hea New Economics Papers
on Health Economics
Issue of 2013‒11‒09
three papers chosen by
Yong Yin
SUNY at Buffalo

  1. Modeling catastrophic deaths using EVT with a microsimulation approach to reinsurance pricing By Matias Leppisaari
  2. Health Insurance Coverage for Low-income Households: Consumption Smoothing and Investment. By Liu, Kai
  3. Revisiting the Educational Effects of Fetal Iodine Deficiency By Bengtsson, Niklas; Peterson, Stefan; Sävje, Fredrik

  1. By: Matias Leppisaari
    Abstract: Recently, a marked Poisson process (MPP) model for life catastrophe risk was proposed in [6]. We provide a justification and further support for the model by considering more general Poisson point processes in the context of extreme value theory (EVT), and basing the choice of model on statistical tests and model comparisons. A case study examining accidental deaths in the Finnish population is provided. We further extend the applicability of the catastrophe risk model by considering small and big accidents separately; the resulting combined MPP model can flexibly capture the whole range of accidental death counts. Using the proposed model, we present a simulation framework for pricing (life) catastrophe reinsurance, based on modeling the underlying policies at individual contract level. The accidents are first simulated at population level, and their effect on a specific insurance company is then determined by explicitly simulating the resulting insured deaths. The proposed microsimulation approach can potentially lead to more accurate results than the traditional methods, and to a better view of risk, as it can make use of all the information available to the re/insurer and can explicitly accommodate even complex re/insurance terms and product features. As an example we price several excess reinsurance contracts. The proposed simulation model is also suitable for solvency assessment.
    Date: 2013–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:1310.8604&r=hea
  2. By: Liu, Kai (Dept. of Economics, Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration)
    Abstract: I estimate the effects of public health insurance on consumption smoothing and investigate the extent to which the public insurance interacts with private arrangements of self-insurance. Exploiting a dramatic expansion in health insurance coverage in rural China, I find that the introduction of public health insurance helps households completely insure against severe health shocks. The health insurance also reduces the magnitude of decline during a health shock in investments in children's education, agricultural activities and durable goods. The evidence suggests that the benefit of social insurance for low-income households could also come from reducing the use of costly smoothing mechanisms.
    Keywords: Public health insurance; Rural China
    JEL: D10 I10 O10
    Date: 2013–10–24
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:nhheco:2013_016&r=hea
  3. By: Bengtsson, Niklas (Uppsala Center for Labor Studies); Peterson, Stefan (Department of Public Health Sciences, Karolinska Institutet); Sävje, Fredrik (Uppsala Center for Labor Studies)
    Abstract: Recent research has reported positive effects on schooling due to in utero protection from iodine deficiency resulting from iodized oil capsule distribution in Tanzania. We revisit the Tanzanian experience by investigating how these effects differ over time and across surveys; across different treatment specifications; and across additional educational outcome measures. Contrary to previous studies, we find that the estimated effects tend to be small and not robust across specifications or samples. Using all available data and a medically motivated iodine depletion function, we find no evidence of a positive long-run effect of iodine deficiency protection on educational attainment.
    Keywords: Iodine de ciency; Education; Prenatal exposure; Multiple outcomes; Replication; Field; Robles; Torero
    JEL: I12 I21 J16 O15
    Date: 2013–10–25
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:uulswp:2013_013&r=hea

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