Optimal Tax Deductions for Net Losses Under Private Insurance With an Upper Limit

Kaplow (1992b) shows that governments should not provide a tax deduction for net losses when a private insurance contract is available. However, his findings rest on the assumption that the private insurance is proportional coverage. We find that Kaplow's conclusions may not hold when the private insurance contract contains an upper limit. The findings of our article show that Kaplow's conclusions are sensitive to the assumption that the insurance contract is available in the private market.     

The Aggregate Demand for Private Health Insurance Coverage in the United States

This article estimates the aggregate demand for private health insurance coverage in the United States using an error correction model for the period 1966–1999. Both short- and long-run price and income elasticities of demand are estimated. The empirical findings indicate that both private insurance enrollment and the completeness of insurance are relatively inelastic with respect to changes in price and income in the short and long run. Moreover, the results suggest that an increase in the number cyclically and frictionally uninsured generates less welfare loss than an increase in the number of structurally uninsured.     

Homeowners Insurance With Bundled Catastrophe Coverage

We estimate the demand for homeowners insurance in Florida and New York with indicated loss costs as our proxy for the quantity of real insurance services demanded. We decompose the demand into the demand for coverage of catastrophe perils and the demand for noncatastrophe coverage and estimate these demand functions separately. Our results are relatively consistent in New York and Florida, including evidence that catastrophe demand is more price elastic than noncatastrophe demand. We also find evidence that consumers value options that expand coverage, buy more insurance when it is subsidized through regulatory price constraints, and consider state guaranty fund provisions when purchasing insurance.     

Precautionary Insurance Demand With State-Dependent Background Risk

This article considers a zero‐mean background risk that is uncorrelated with insurable losses, but is not necessarily statistically independent. In particular, the size of the background risk can vary in different insurable‐loss states. We show how a prudent individual will buy either more insurance or less insurance than with no background risk, depending on the relative size of the background risk in the loss states vis‐á‐vis the no‐loss states. If we consider two individuals, with one more risk averse than the other, we need to compare the intensities of their precautionary motives, in addition to their measures of risk aversion, before we can determine who buys more insurance coverage in the presence of the state dependent background risk.     

The Impact of Regret on the Demand for Insurance

We examine optimal insurance purchase decisions of individuals that exhibit behavior consistent with Regret Theory. Our model incorporates a utility function that assigns a disutility to outcomes that are ex post suboptimal, and predicts that individuals with regret‐theoretical preferences adjust away from the extremes of full insurance and no insurance coverage. This prediction holds for both coinsurance and deductible contracts, and can explain the frequently observed preferences for low deductibles in markets for personal insurance.     

The Effects of Uncertainty on the Demand for Health Insurance

This article analyzes the effects of uncertainty and increases in risk aversion on the demand for health insurance using a theoretical model that highlights the interdependence between insurance and health care demand decisions. Two types of uncertainty faced by the individuals are examined. The first one is the uncertainty in the consumer's pretreatment health and the second is the uncertainty surrounding the productivity of health care. Comparative statics results are reported indicating the impact on the demand for insurance of shifts in the distributions of pretreatment health and productivity of health care in the form of first‐order stochastic dominance, Rothschild–Stiglitz mean‐preserving spreads, and second‐order stochastic dominance. The demand for insurance increases in response to a Rothschild–Stiglitz increase in risk in the distribution of the pretreatment health provided that the health production function is in a special class and the price elasticity of health care is nondecreasing in the pretreatment health. Provided also that the demand for health care is own‐price inelastic, the same conclusion is obtained when the uncertainty is about the productivity of health care.     

The Demand for Life Insurance in OECD Countries

This article examines the determinants of life insurance consumption in OECD countries. Consistent with previous results, we find a significant positive income elasticity of life insurance demand. Demand also increases with the number of dependents and level of education, and decreases with life expectancy and social security expenditure. The country's level of financial development and its insurance market's degree of competition appear to stimulate life insurance sales, whereas high inflation and real interest rates tend to decrease consumption. Overall, life insurance demand is better explained when the product market and socioeconomic factors are jointly considered. In addition, the use of GMM estimates helps reconcile our findings with previous puzzling results based on inconsistent OLS estimates given heteroscedasticity problems in the data.     

经济政策不确定性对人寿保险需求的影响

根据背景风险理论推测,经济政策不确定性作为一类不可保的宏观政策风险,可能对保险需求变动产生影响。本文利用Baker等(2013)测算的中国经济政策不确定性指数,实证检验了经济政策不确定性对中国各省人寿保险需求变动的影响,以及在不同异质性条件下的影响差异。结果发现:第一,经济政策不确定性对寿险需求有显著正影响,且其在经济周期的不同阶段存在显著差异;第二,教育水平的提升会一定程度促进经济政策不确定性对寿险需求的正影响;第三,经济政策不确定性对不同类型寿险需求的影响存在差异,具有保障功能的普通寿险和投资收益灵活稳健的万能险需求受到显著正影响;最后,经济政策不确定性对人寿保险保费增长的影响主要集中在新单保费。因此,政府部门应在保证经济政策连贯性的同时,提升民众的教育水平和避险意识,引导其主动购买保险,尽量降低政策波动产生的影响,分类推进不同类型人寿保险市场的扩大。     

On the Demand for Portfolio Insurance

While insurers manage underwriting risk with various methods including reinsurance, insurers increasingly manage asset risk with options, futures, and other derivatives. Previous research shows that buyers of portfolio insurance pay considerably for downside protection. We add to this literature by providing the first evidence on the cost of portfolio insurance, the payoff to portfolio insurance, and the relative demand for portfolio insurance across VIX levels. We find that the demand for portfolio insurance is relatively high at low levels of VIX, suggesting purchasers demand more downside protection when this protection is cheap on an absolute basis (but expensive on a relative basis). We also provide the first evidence on the hedging behavior of specific investor classes and show that the demand for portfolio insurance is driven by retail investors (individuals) who buy costly insurance from institutional investors. Results are consistent with other types of paradoxical insurance‐buying behavior.     

Exclusions and the Demand for Property Insurance

The paper examines property insurance contracts in which consumers choose the upper limit on coverage. Exclusions are of two types, and both reduce the demand for insurance of the included perils. A practical implication is that an insurer can raise the demand for fire insurance by offering an earthquake rider, and profit from the rider even when the premia are ceded in such a way that the rider does not raise profit directly. The results do not require assumptions about correlations between included and excluded losses, which is interesting because correlations are decisive in most of the other literature on background risk.     

货币政策的保险需求传导效应——基于中国的实证研究

选取2000年1月至2010年12月的月度数据,运用单位根检验、协整关系检验和格兰杰因果关系检验等当代主流的计量经济学研究方法,建立结构向量自回归模型(SVAR),并运用脉冲响应函数对我国货币政策保险需求渠道的运作机制和传导效果进行深层次的长期静态分析和短期动态分析。实证结果表明我国货币政策的保险需求传导机制是存在的。     

存款准备金率的上限分析

存款准备金的定义及作用存款准备金是指金融机构为保证客户提取存款和资金清算需要而准备的在中央银行的存款。中央银行要求的存款准备金占其存款总额的比例就是存款准备金率。1863年美国通过了《国家     

An Examination of the Demand for Life Insurance

For almost 50 years researchers have sought to explain consumer behavior concerning the purchase of life insurance. This study examines the literature relating to specific demographic and economic factors that may be identifiable as traits influencing the demand for life insurance, and discusses general environmental issues that may relate to life insurance demand. By organizing the wealth of literature in a useful and systematic format, noting consistencies and contradictions, this examination seeks to provide a better understanding of how and why life insurance purchases are made.     

保险需求价格弹性与保险监管政策选择

通过对保险费率和保险金额进行线性回归得出两个命题:保险需求与保险产品的价格负相关;保险产品缺乏价格需求弹性。这两个命题的适应条件分别是:保险产品是正常商品和相对封闭的市场上的一类保险产品的总需求。因此,保险公司要在保险费率和保险总收入之间均衡,而保险监管则要建立在协调保险价格和受众群体利益均衡的基础之上。     

Changes in Background Risk and the Demand for Insurance

The demand for insurance against loss from a particular risky asset is likely to depend on other risks the decision-maker faces. For independently distributed other risks, referred to as background risk, Eeckhoudt and Kimball [1992] determine the effect on insurance demand of introducing background risk. Recently, Eeckhoudt, Gollier, and Schlesinger [1996] determine conditions on preferences such that first- and second-degree stochastic deteriorations in background risk lead to a decrease in the decision-maker's willingness to accept other risks. These results, although formulated in a general decision model, also apply to insurance demand. This article continues analysis of this question by determining the effect on insurance demand of several other general changes in background risk.     

The Demand for Life Insurance: An Application of the Economics of Uncertainty

Financial economists typically assume that capital income uncertainty, derived from investments in uncertain returned marketable securities, represents the major source of household consumption uncertainty. But, for many households, if not most, labor income uncertainty dominates capital income uncertainty. This study analyzes households optimal reactions to labor income (human capital) uncertainty that is derived from the possibility of their wage earners' non–survival. By introducing a risk resolution mechanism—an insurance market—and allowing for the possibility that future tastes may be state–dependent, simple demand–for–insurance equations are mathematically derived to explicitly describe households optimal responses to human capital uncertainty.     

影响我国保险业的需求因素分析

本文从经济发展水平、产业结构、所有制结构、经济增长方式、经济运行方式、社会收入结构、社会支出结构、人口结构和居民金融资产九个影响保险业需求的因素着手,运用一元线性回归和因子分析法对我国1985-2007年的资料进行实证研究。实证表明,各影响因素与保费收入存在线性相关关系,且影响我国保险业的主要需求因素是经济发展、科技发展和社会发展。     

中国非寿险需求与经济增长关系研究

本文利用1980～2006年中国非寿险需求与经济增长的年度数据,运用协整分析技术和基于误差修正模型的因果关系分析方法,分析非寿险需求与经济增长之间的关系。结果显示:非寿险需求与经济增长之间有明显的协整关系;非寿险需求与经济增长不存在短期双向Granger因果关系;在长期经济增长构成了非寿险需求的Granger原因,但非寿险需求没有成为经济增长的Granger原因。需要充分重视非寿险需求与经济增长之间的有机联系,在继续研究如何维持经济又好又快增长的同时,着手解决非寿险业发展面临的问题,以实现两者的良性互动。     

中国农业保险供需"双冷"的经济解释

经过二十多年的发展,中国农业保险并没有承担起保障农业生产安全、防范农业风险的职能,而是陷入了“供给有限、需求不足”的尴尬境地。究其原因,从供求角度看,过高的经营成本和赔付率导致保险公司供给不足,农民的低收入和农业保险的高费率则造成需求疲软。从产品属性来看,农业保险供需“双冷”的成因在于它是一种“准公共物品”,其供给和需求的双重“正外部性”导致资源配置失当。有效的解决办法是让政府参与农业保险的供给,即开展政策性农业保险。