Data Impediments to Empirical Work on Health Insurance Markets

Dafny Leemore (), David Dranove, Limbrock Frank () and Scott Morton Fiona ()
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Dafny Leemore: Northwestern University
Limbrock Frank: Northwestern University
Scott Morton Fiona: Yale School of Management

The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, 2011, vol. 11, issue 2, 24

Abstract: We compare four datasets that researchers might use to study competition in the health insurance industry. We show that the two datasets most commonly used to estimate market concentration differ considerably from each other (both in levels and in changes over time), and reflect implausibly high volatility in market shares. By comparison, market share volatility is much lower in a private dataset gathered by a leading investment bank, and in state-level hospital discharge data. We also demonstrate that the outcome of regressions using these data vary considerably by the source used. We conclude that researchers should be cautious about using available data and recommend a new source be developed for public use.

Keywords: market structure; concentration; health insurance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

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DOI: 10.2202/1935-1682.2822

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