Presentation

Session: Competition in Insurance
Room: Main Hall
Time: Fri 11:45-13:00

Presenter: Ilaria Mosca (Tilburg University. Economics)

Abstract: In countries like the US and the Netherlands health insurance is provided by private firms. These private firms can offer both individual and group contracts.
The strategic and welfare implications of such group contracts are not
well understood. Using a Dutch data set of about 700 group health insurance
contracts over the period 2007-2008, we estimate a model to determine which
factors explain the price of group contracts. We find that groups that are located close to an insurers’ home turf pay a higher premium than other groups.
This finding is not consistent with the bargaining argument in the literature
as it implies that concentrated groups close to an insurers’ home turf should
get a larger (if any) discount than other groups. A simple Hotelling model,
however, does explain our empirical results.
Key Terms: health insurance, health plan choice, managed competition, Hotelling model
Authors:: Ilaria Mosca (Tilburg University. Economics) , Jan Boone (Tilburg University. Economics) , Rudy Douven (Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis) and Carline Dröge (Sint Franciscus hospital)

Presentation: Health insurance competition: The effect of group contracts