Does Health Insurance Reduce the Alcohol Consumption? Evidence from China Health and Nutrition Survey

Chenhao Yu, Huigang Liang and Zhiruo Zhang
Additional contact information
Chenhao Yu: School of Public Health, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200025, China
Huigang Liang: Department of Business and Information Technology, Fogelman College of Business and Economics, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN 38152, USA
Zhiruo Zhang: School of Public Health, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200025, China

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 9, 1-10

Abstract: Whether health insurance reduces alcohol consumption has been debated. To identify it, the authors used three-wave balance panel data from China Health and Nutrition Survey and applied a two-way fixed-effect model. The authors found that (1) health insurance reduces alcohol consumption, (2) the effect would be deducted when they have been diagnosed with diabetes, (3) the heterogeneity existed between old and young individuals as well as rural and urban areas, those old individuals would behave more cautious, and urban individuals would consume more alcohol. This study identified the effects of health insurance and the moderating effect of diabetes, which were helpful for policymakers to optimize health insurance policy to ensure the sustainability of health insurance and suggested that primary medical staff should assist patients to establish healthy living habits and reduce their risky behaviors.

Keywords: health insurance; ex-ante moral hazard; alcohol consumption (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/9/5693/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/9/5693/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:9:p:5693-:d:811156

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().