Health Insurance Mandates in a Model with Consumer Bankruptcy

Gilad Sorek and David Benjamim

No auwp2015-05, Auburn Economics Working Paper Series from Department of Economics, Auburn University

Abstract: We study insurance take-up choices by consumers who face medical-expense and income risks, knowing they can default on medical bills by filing bankruptcy. For a given bankruptcy system we explore total and distributional welfare effects of health insurance mandates, compared with pre-mandates market equilibrium. We consider different combinations of premium-subsides and out-of-insurance penalties, confining attention to budgetary neutral policies. We show that when insurance mandates are enforced through penalties only, the efficient take-up level may be incomplete. However, if mandates are supported also with premium subsidies full insurance coverage is efficient and can be also Pareto improving. Such policies are consistent with the incentives structure set in the ACA for insurance take-up.

Keywords: Consumer Bankruptcy; Health Insurance Mandates; Welfare (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea and nep-ias
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Journal Article: Health insurance mandates in a model with consumer bankruptcy (2016)
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