Potential determinants of deductible uptake in health insurance: How to increase uptake in The Netherlands?

K. P. M. Winssen (), R. C. Kleef and W. P. M. M. Ven
Additional contact information
K. P. M. Winssen: Erasmus University Rotterdam
R. C. Kleef: Erasmus University Rotterdam
W. P. M. M. Ven: Erasmus University Rotterdam

The European Journal of Health Economics, 2016, vol. 17, issue 9, No 2, 1059-1072

Abstract: Abstract In health insurance, voluntary deductibles are offered to the insured in return for a premium rebate. Previous research has shown that 11 % of the Dutch insured opted for a voluntary deductible (VD) in health insurance in 2014, while the highest VD level was financially profitable for almost 50 % of the population in retrospect. To explain this discrepancy, this paper identifies and discusses six potential determinants of the decision to opt for a VD from the behavioral economic literature: loss aversion, risk attitude, ambiguity aversion, debt aversion, omission bias, and liquidity constraints. Based on these determinants, five potential strategies are proposed to increase the number of insured opting for a VD. Presenting the VD as the default option and providing transparent information regarding the VD are the two most promising strategies. If, as a result of these strategies, more insured would opt for a VD, moral hazard would be reduced.

Keywords: Voluntary deductibles; Moral hazard; Health insurance; Behavioral economics; Prospect theory; Nudge theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D03 D11 D81 I11 I13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (14)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10198-015-0745-2 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:spr:eujhec:v:17:y:2016:i:9:d:10.1007_s10198-015-0745-2

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... cs/journal/10198/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s10198-015-0745-2

Access Statistics for this article

The European Journal of Health Economics is currently edited by J.-M.G.v.d. Schulenburg

More articles in The European Journal of Health Economics from Springer, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().