Managed care and the near-elderly: effects of plan enrollment on functionality

This paper examines the effects of enrollment in a health maintenance organization (HMO) or a preferred provider organization (PPO) on the functional status of near-elderly adults (aged 55–64), compared to traditional fee-for-service (FFS) plans. A sample of 1306 near-elderly adults with employer-sponsored health insurance are drawn from the 2000–2002 waves of the Health and Retirement Study, a nationally representative panel survey of community-dwelling adults. Regression models are estimated to assess the effects of different types of insurance plans on functionality, as measured by whether or not the individual has any functional limitations. The potential influence of selection bias into alternative types of plans is addressed by limiting the sample to near-elders without a choice of health plans. The effects of HMOs on functionality are shown to be comparable to those of FFS plans among the general near-elderly population. However, significant adverse effects of HMO enrollment on functional status are observed among near-elders with chronic conditions. PPO enrollees have similar functional outcome to FFS enrollees, even among those with chronic conditions. The observed differences in functional outcome across plans have important implications for the practicality of managed care plans serving older adults.     

Will the skill-premium in the Netherlands rise in the next decades?

While the skill-premium has been rising sharply in the US and the UK for 20 years, the Dutch skill-premium decreased for much of that period and only started to rise in the early 90s. In this article, we investigate whether the Dutch skill-premium will rise in the next decades. To answer this question, we forecast the skill-premium using the Katz and Murphy (1992 Katz, L and Murphy, K. 1992. Changes in relative wages, 1963–1987: supply and demand factors. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 107: 35–78. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) and the Krusell et al. (2000 Krusell, P, Ohanian, L, Ríos-Rull, J-V and Violante, G. 2000. Capital-skill complementarity and inequality: a macroeconomic analysis. Econometrica, 68: 1029–53. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) models. The Katz and Murphy model (KM) explains demand shifts by skill-biased technological change in unobservable variables captured by a time trend. In contrast, the Krusell et al. model (KORV) explains demand shifts by (observable) changes in the capital stock under a capital-skill complementarity technology. The results show that while the KM model predicts that the skill-premium will have increased by 30% in 2020, based on realistic predictions of the stock of capital, the KORV model predicts that the skill-premium will remain between ?5 and +5% of its 1996 level.     

The strategic nature of advertising in segmented markets

We develop a simple model in which firm-specific advertising has cooperative and predatory effects. Our model is set in a static market where firms are naturally segmented into two distinct submarkets: several large firms located in the core, with small firms operating as a fringe. We test the net effect of opposing market size (cooperative) and market share (predatory) effects of both fringe and core firm advertising on the advertising decisions of large firms in several US consumer industries. Empirically, fringe firm advertising leads to an increase in advertising efforts by large firms, implying strategic complementarity. On the other hand, increased advertising by core firms in an industry decreases advertising expenditures of other core firms, indicating they are strategic substitutes. Our findings imply that equilibrium levels of advertising can be greater with asymmetric, rather than symmetric, strategic interactions.     

The stability of the Turkish Phillips curve and alternative regime shifting models

This article, presents empirical evidence supporting instability of the Phillips curve in Turkey. We employ the multiple structural break models and the Markov-switching models and then evaluate the performance of the two models. The data pertain to the monthly inflation rate in Turkey for the period of 1987 to 2004. The results show that the Turkish Phillips curve is not linear. There exists no evidence on the asymmetry in the inflation response to output gap. The persistence of inflation is found to be much lower than in linear models. After 2001, slight decline in persistence of inflation is observed. There exits weaker support for the Phillips curve for the periods where the policymakers attempt to take the advantage of the tradeoff between output and inflation relationship.     

Consumption smoothing and vulnerability in Russia

Applying bootstrapped quantile regression to the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (RLMS) data, we examine the channels through which individuals experience and seek to cope with changes in consumption. We find that married individuals living in small households, with educated heads in urban areas are better equipped to smooth consumption. Investigating the impact of idiosyncratic shocks, we find that the labour market is an important transmission mechanism allowing households to smooth their consumption but also exposing them to risk, mainly through job loss. Outside of pension payments, the formal social safety net does not facilitate consumption smoothing, thus heightening the importance of informal coping institutions. It transpires that both support from relatives/friends and home production act as important insurance mechanisms for the most vulnerable. In contrast with previous findings, it would seem that regardless of its historical, political and social roots, the garden plots and dachas, often romanticized in Russian literature, do provide a means by which ‘urban’ Russians are able to cope with economic fluctuations. We finish by stressing the important policy lessons for Russia's developing market economy.     

Impact of financial reforms on efficiency of state-owned,private and foreign banks in Pakistan

This article uses a unique bank level data from 1991 to 2000 and evaluates how financial reforms affect banking efficiency of domestic and foreign banks in Pakistan. The results suggest that banking efficiency falls during initial reform period when banks adjust to enhanced competition but increases in more advanced stages of reform. While in general foreign and private banks show superior efficiency and factor productivity than do state-owned banks, the relative performance of foreign banks worsens after the consolidation stage of the financial reforms is over. We show the importance of link between bank size, asset quality and bank branches with efficiency indexes and also note that every 10% increase in share of nonperforming to total loans decreases banking efficiency by 6 to 10%.     

Does more medical care improve population health? New evidence for an old controversy

This article investigates the aggregate relationship between medical care and health for the US population. I use annual state level panel data for the period 1983 to 2000 to estimate static and dynamic health production function models. I find no compelling evidence that greater aggregate utilization of medical care from application of existing technology improves population health by lowering mortality in the short run or long run. My results suggest that development of new medical technologies that diffuse rapidly throughout the nation and at different rates across states may well explain much of the decline in the age-adjusted death rate over the past several decades, as well as persistent differences in mortality across geographic regions. Overall, my findings suggest that the US may be experiencing ‘flat of the curve medicine’ with future improvements in mortality from medical care coming from new and better technologies rather than greater intensity of services.     

Determinants of ICT adoption: evidence from firm-level data

We analyse factors driving inter- and intra-firm diffusion of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) using data from Irish manufacturing firms over the period 2001 to 2004. We find that the path of ICT diffusion has been uneven across firms, industries and space, which is consistent with the theory of new technology adoption. Our results suggest that firms that are larger, younger, fast growing, skill-intensive, export-intensive and firms located in the capital city region have been relatively more successful in adopting and using ICT. We find positive technology spillovers from firms that have adopted ICT located in the same industry and region.     

Technical change,technical efficiency,and input usage in Taiwanese agricultural growth

We analyse the increase in sales of Pick 3 and Pick 4 daily numbers lottery games and other Ohio Lottery games after Ohio introduced midday drawings for the Pick 3 and Pick 4 games in August 1999. The midday drawings increased Pick 3 sales by 5%, Pick 4 sales by 12%, and total lottery sales by 2% based on our analysis of a 36-month panel dataset of Ohio lottery sales by zip code. Midday drawings raise more revenue from the strongly regressive daily numbers games. However, the introduction of midday drawings does not change the negative income elasticities of demand for numbers games in an economically meaningful manner.