A proposal for more sophisticated normative principles in introductory economics

Introductory textbooks teach a simple normative story about the importance of maximizing economic surplus that supports common policy claims. There is little defense of the claim that maximizing surplus is normatively important, which is not obvious to non-economists. Difficulties with the claim that society should maximize surplus are generally not addressed. Economists are thus frequently criticized by non-economists for having a poor moral foundation for our normative claims. We should tell a more sophisticated normative story that justifies the moral importance of surplus, but acknowledges that other moral values may conflict with generating surplus and that distribution is not always separable from efficiency. This would allow students to make more compelling arguments in favor of normative positions they accept, regardless of the values they hold.     

The impact of private hospital insurance on the utilization of hospital care in Australia

We use the Australian National Health Survey to estimate the impact of private hospital insurance on the propensity for hospitalization as a private patient. We account for the potential endogeneity of supplementary private hospital insurance purchases and calculate moral hazard based on a difference-of-means estimator. We decompose the moral hazard estimate into a diversion component that is due to an insurance-induced substitution away from public patient care towards private patient care, and an expansion component that measures a pure insurance-induced increase in the propensity to seek private patient care. Our results suggest that on average, private hospital insurance causes a sizable and significant increase in the likelihood of hospital admission as a private patient. However, there is little evidence of an expansion effect; the treatment effect of private hospital insurance on private patient care is driven almost entirely by the substitution away from public patient care towards private patient care. We discuss the implications for policies that aim to expand supplementary private insurance coverage for the purpose of reducing excess demand on the public healthcare system.     

Creating infographics to enhance student engagement and communication in health economics

In this article, the authors discuss and describe the implementation of and lessons learned from a course project centered on the creation of an infographic in a health economics course and an introduction to health research course. Students were asked to create a simple infographic about a particular topic, after researching and gathering data on that topic. The instructors observed how students synthesized information and data to tell a visual story with their infographic. This article adds to the limited literature regarding infographics in undergraduate instruction. An infographic offers faculty an opportunity to apply active learning strategies to enhance student engagement, retention of information, and communication skills.     

Medical Dominance and Institutional Change in the Delivery of Health Care Services

This paper puts the theory of medical dominance, as it understood as a sociological theory of historical change, into a broader theory of institutional change of the delivery of medical care. The application of medical dominance theory to three institutional contexts (Australia, USA, and Canada) is reviewed. The possibility of progressive institutional change in the delivery of medical care is addressed, as well as the type of technological innovation that might accompany such institutional change. The concept of medical dominance is useful to explain the dominant characteristics supporting the institution of medical practice. However, an explanatory theory of the evolution of health care delivery should be linked to the instrumentally warranted standards for medical care. These standards are then discussed.

Globalization with a human face

This paper has six parts. The first part defines globalization. The second discusses globalization eras. The third discusses the irreversibility and inevitability of globalization. The fourth section discusses the benefits and costs of globalization. The fifth section asks what is to be done. The sixth section contains my conclusions.     

Enhancing the teaching of introductory economics with a team-based,multi-section competition

The authors describe a unique approach to enhancing student learning at the introductory economics level that utilizes a multi-section, team-based competition. The competition is structured to supplement learning throughout the entire introductory course. Student teams are presented with current economic issues, trends, or events, and use economic tools and theories to comprehensively examine the topics. Students present their analyses in their own sections with one team from each section moving on to compete in an inter-section round. Students are judged on technicality, creativity, and applicability of economic concepts. The competition has the potential to advance students' creativity, collaboration, communication, and critical and analytical thinking skills, while enhancing their ability to apply foundational economic concepts to real-world settings.     

过度医疗行为的理论、实证与管理式医疗制度

本文是一篇文献综述,主要回顾过度医疗行为的理论与实证研究成果;其次,阐述与分析了以该理论为基础的美国管理式医疗与支付制度。     

Unbalanced growth and health care expenditure

Baumol's model of unbalanced growth implies that health care expenditure (HCE) is driven by wage increases in excess of productivity growth. However, it remains unclear whether the HCE in developing countries is affected by the same factor. This paper tests this hypothesis by using China provincial panel data. We show that HCE grows more rapidly if economy‐wide wage growth exceeds productivity growth in China. The results are robust to the use of housing price as an instrumental variable for the economy‐wide nominal wage and the inclusion of real GDP growth, demographic structure, government deficit, pollution emissions and health sector quality as control variables. Furthermore, our findings show that Baumol's cost disease plays a more important role in the less economically developed western regions in which the rural–urban migration is less pronounced.     

论马克思主义政治经济学理论创新——兼论政治经济学学科的发展方向

本文拟在三个既定前提条件下论证三个命题.三个既定前提条件是:1.中国新民主主义革命胜利、新中国和社会主义制度的建立,是马克思主义与中国实际结合的产物;2.1978年开始的改革开放和现代化建设,是在中国化的马克思主义指导下进行的;3.今后中国的改革发展还要以马克思主义为指导.要论证的三个命题是:1.马克思主义政治经济学必须创新;2.马克思主义政治经济学能够创新;3.马克思主义政治经济学创新的基本方向是:坚持实践第一,坚持把马克思主义基本原理与中国实际相结合,坚持吸收人类创造的一切文明成果.     

New evidence on factors affecting the level and growth of US health care spending

The dual problems of high and rising medical care expenditures and substantial differences in spending across geographic regions have long plagued the US health care system. We provide new evidence to explain why some states and regions of the country spend much more on medical care than others, and why health care spending for the nation as a whole has been growing rapidly over the last several decades. To do this, we estimate a health care spending panel data model using annual data on all 50 states for the period 1993–2009. Our model includes a number of socio-economic, health care provider, lifestyle and environmental variables that past studies indicate may affect the level or growth of aggregate health care spending. We exploit the time effect component of our model to obtain an upper-bound estimate of the effect of advances in medical technology. Our findings indicate that the most important factors influencing the level of spending are availability of providers, income, excessive alcohol consumption, Medicaid coverage, HMO health plans and the proportion of the population elderly and African-American. The principal drivers of growth have been the continual introduction of new medical technologies, and the growth of providers and income.     

《农业经济学》课程教学方式的改进与实践

农业经济学是农业高校农林经济管理专业、农村区域发展等专业的本科专业基础课,在专业课程体系构造中具有十分重要的地位。结合所在教学团队多年来的实践和体会,从农业经济学课堂教学方式、实践教学方式及考试方式等方面提出改进的建议,以提高农业经济学课程的教学水平。     

高职《西方经济学》教学改革探讨

《西方经济学》是我国高职院校经济管理类专业开设的一门核心课程。但由于该课程有其自身的特点,而教学过程中又存在一定的误区,使得目前许多高职院校《西方经济学》都存在教学效果不理想的状况。为此,分析了当前高职《西方经济学》教学中存在的问题,并在此基础上提出了教学改革的对策与建议。     

The U.S. health care expenditure: evidence from 2001 to 2009

This study utilizes state-level data from 2001 to 2009 to estimate the impact of the 2007 financial crisis upon health care expenditures. Higher death rates are consistently found to have a positive and statistically significant impact on health expenditures. While mental health and COPD are not generally found to impact expenditures, increases in the percentage of the population diagnosed with cholesterol and obesity tend to increase health expenditures. Increases in health expenditures slowed considerably after the financial crisis. Even though recessions (high unemployment rates) are generally found to have a positive impact on health expenditures, the post-financial crisis time period is estimated to have much lower health expenditures than in other time periods. Our results can be used to give insight into the conditions under which the slower rate of increase in health expenditures can be expected to increase. More research will be needed to be able to more completely explore not only the reasons for these changes in health expenditures but also whether they are likely to continue into the future.     

Effects of health insurance on labour supply: evidence from the health care fund for the poor in Vietnam

The expansion of health insurance in emerging countries raises concerns about the unintended negative effects of health insurance on labour supply. This article examines the labour supply effects of the Health Care Fund for the Poor (HCFP) in Vietnam in terms of the number of work hours per month and labour force participation (the probability of employment). Employing various matching methods combined with a Difference-in-Differences approach on the Vietnam Household Living Standard Surveys 2002–2006, we show that the HCFP, which aims to provide poor people and disadvantaged minority groups with free health insurance, has a negative effect on labour supply. This is manifested in both the average number of hours worked per month and the probability of employment, suggesting the income effect of the HCFP. Interestingly, the effects are mainly driven by the non-poor recipients living in rural areas, raising the question of the targeting strategy of the programme.     

Testing cointegration between health care expenditure and GDP in Japan with the presence of a regime shift

Using quarterly data from 1994 through 2013, this article is the first to use the Hansen and Seo (2002) tests to examine the long-term relationship between real per-capita GDP (PGDP) and real per-capita health care expenditure (PHCE) in Japan with threshold effects. We detect the presence of a threshold cointegrating relationship between the two variables. In addition, we find that error correction adjustments are significantly conducted only through PGDP in a typical regime, whereas both PGDP and PHCE drive the adjustments in the extreme regime. We find that the extreme regime occurred mainly after Q4 2008, implying that the policy introducing the late-stage medical care system for the elderly in April 2008, which expanded the ratio of personal expenses for the elderly, may be effective for attaining a long-run equilibrium between PGDP and PHCE.     

Prenatal care: Mechanisms and impacts on infant health and health care utilization

We estimate that prenatal care has positive impacts on health measured at birth, shifts the distribution of future health care utilization away from inpatient care, and find that some of these impacts likely come from an informational mechanism. We also find well child visits are used in a complementary fashion with emergency department care in the production of infant health, suggesting that factors beyond barriers to access may drive the demand for emergency care. Finally, we find differential impacts of prenatal care across racial groups with evidence that the information mechanism may be particularly important for black mothers.     

西方经济学本科教学改革探讨

西方经济学是经济管理类本科专业的基础性必修课程,其教学效果的好坏直接影响学生对其他相关课程的掌握程度。然而当前一些本科院校西方经济学课程的教学效果并不理想。如何对该课程进行科学革新,更好地发挥其基础性地位,进而帮助学生更好地掌握专业知识,是本课程教学改革的主要目标。     

提升微观经济学教学有效性的探讨

微观经济学是经管类专业的专业基础课,在实际的教学中,教学效果并不理想。究其原因,主要是由于授课方式、授课主体和授课对象等多方面的配合不当。因此,增加案例式教学、提倡教师参加社会生产实践锻炼、调动学生学习的主动性、引入先进的教学方式的教学手段是提升微观经济学教学有效性的重要途径。     

The relationship between the markets for health insurance and medical malpractice insurance

This article evaluates the interdependence of medical malpractice insurance markets and health insurance markets. Prior research has addressed the performance of these markets, individually, without specifically quantifying the extent to which they are linked. Increasing levels of health insurance losses could increase the scale of potential malpractice claims, boosting medical malpractice losses, or could embody an improvement in medical care quality, which will reduce malpractice losses. Our results for a state panel data set from 2002 to 2009 demonstrate that health insurance losses are negatively related to medical malpractice insurance losses. An additional dollar of health insurance losses is associated with a $0.01–$0.05 reduction in medical malpractice losses. These findings have potentially important implications for assessments of the net cost of health insurance policies.     

美国医疗保健模式及其改革

由于倡导自由市场经济的文化和社会背景,美国是唯一没有实行全国统一的医疗保障制度的发达国家。本文对美国医疗保险制度、美国医院的管理运行机制、美国医疗保险付费方式的沿革进行了系统的介绍,并梳理了美国医疗保健管理模式的特点与问题,结合奥巴马政府医疗保健改革要点,对我国医疗保健体系改革提出了几点建议。