Heuristics and Heterogeneity in Health Insurance Exchanges: Evidence from the Massachusetts Connector.

We examine heuristic decision rules in consumer choice on health insurance exchanges using data from the Massachusetts Connector. Consumers may have difficulty making optimal choices in a complex environment. The heuristic 'choose the cheapest plan' is suggested by the decision context, previous res...

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Publicado en:American Economic Review Vol. 102; no. 3; pp. 493 - 498
Autores principales: Ericson, Keith Marzilli, Starc, Amanda
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: American Economic Association May2012
Materias:
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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        10.1257/aer.102.3.493
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        atl: Heuristics and Heterogeneity in Health Insurance Exchanges: Evidence from the Massachusetts Connector.
      aug:
        au:
          Ericson, Keith Marzilli
          Starc, Amanda
        affil:
          a1
          a2
      su:
        Massachusetts
        Heuristic
        Heterogeneity
        Health insurance
        Consumer preferences
        Insurance exchanges
        Complexity (Philosophy)
        Price sensitivity
        Maximum likelihood statistics
        Logits
        Lognormal distribution
        Heteroscedasticity
      sug:
        subj:
          Heuristic
          Heterogeneity
          Health insurance
          Consumer preferences
          Massachusetts
          All Other Insurance Related Activities
          Direct group life, health and medical insurance carriers
          Direct individual life, health and medical insurance carriers
          Insurance exchanges
          Complexity (Philosophy)
          Price sensitivity
          Maximum likelihood statistics
          Logits
          Lognormal distribution
          Heteroscedasticity
      ab: We examine heuristic decision rules in consumer choice on health insurance exchanges using data from the Massachusetts Connector. Consumers may have difficulty making optimal choices in a complex environment. The heuristic 'choose the cheapest plan' is suggested by the decision context, previous research, and the data: about 20% of enrollees choose the cheapest plan possible. We find evidence of this heuristic in many models, but while heuristics may play a role, preference heterogeneity is also important. Our most flexible models find an insignificant heuristic effect. In part because holding context fixed, this heuristic is observationally equivalent to extreme price sensitivity.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
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