Messaging and the Mandate: The Impact of Consumer Experience on Health Insurance Enrollment Through Exchanges.

The ability of web-based retailers to learn about and provide targeted consumer experiences is touted as an important distinction from traditional retailers. In principal, web-based insurance exchanges could benefit from these advantages. Using data from a large-scale experiment by a private sector...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:American Economic Review Vol. 105; no. 5; pp. 105 - 110
Autores principales: Cox, Natalie, Handel, Benjamin, Kolstad, Jonathan, Mahoney, Neale
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: American Economic Association May2015
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
Descripción
Sumario:The ability of web-based retailers to learn about and provide targeted consumer experiences is touted as an important distinction from traditional retailers. In principal, web-based insurance exchanges could benefit from these advantages. Using data from a large-scale experiment by a private sector health insurance exchange we estimate the returns to experimentation and targeted messaging. We find significant improvements in conversions in one treatment tested. Underlying the average impact were both intertemporal and demographic heterogeneity. We estimate that learning and targeted messaging could increase insurance applications by approximately 13 percent of the baseline conversion rate.