Subsidy Policies and Insurance Demand - A Reproducibility and Replicability Assessment of Cai et al. (2020)

Jens Rommel, Florian Neubauer and Julian Rose

No 343, I4R Discussion Paper Series from The Institute for Replication (I4R)

Abstract: This reproduction report reassesses the findings of Cai, de Janvry, and Sadoulet (2020), who conducted a randomized controlled trial (RCT) on insurance uptake among rice farmers in rural China. The original study found that payout experience increases future insurance adoption, particularly when combined with financial education. We reproduce the paper's main results using the publicly available data and code. The computational reproduction is successful after correcting a minor coding error that had negligible effects on estimates. We focus on four key outcomes corresponding to the paper's main claims - namely, short-term insurance uptake following payout experience with and without a full subsidy and long-term insurance uptake following payout experience conditional on financial education. We conduct an extended multiverse of robustness checks, combining analytical choices related to control variables, risk attitude definitions, and analysis samples. Across 23 alternative specifications per outcome, all paths support the original results. Effect sizes are highly consistent with the original study, and statistical significance patterns remain unchanged. However, the study's construct and external validity are constrained by a limited documentation of the survey instruments, financial training, and implementation procedures. Greater transparency about these aspects would improve the generalizability of the results.

Date: 2026
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