The Efficiency of a Group-Specific Mandated Benefit Revisited: The Effect of Infertility Mandates

Joanna Lahey

No 11-175, Upjohn Working Papers from W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research

Abstract: This paper examines the labor market effects of state health insurance mandates that increase the cost of employing a demographically identifiable group. State mandates requiring that health insurance plans cover infertility treatment raise the relative cost of insuring older women of child-bearing age. Empirically, wages in this group are unaffected, but their total labor input decreases. Workers do not value infertility mandates at cost, and so will not take wage cuts in exchange, leading employers to decrease their demand for this affected and identifiable group. Differences in the empirical effects of mandates found in the literature are explained by a model including variations in the elasticity of demand, moral hazard, ability to identify a group, and adverse selection.

Keywords: labor supply; infertility; health insurance; health insurance mandates (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I18 J13 J23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ias and nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Related works:
Journal Article: The efficiency of a group‐specific mandated benefit revisited: The effect of infertility mandates (2012)
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