Insurance Commons^™

Insurance, Policy, And Education For Livestock Producers, Milan Chauhan, Bradley Lubben

Cornhusker Economics

Federal crop insurance programs have existed since the 1930s, but for livestock producers, federal insurance programs were virtually nonexistent until the past 20 years. Livestock producers may not face exactly the same production risks that crop producers face, but they do face similar production risks related to grazing capacity and forage production and of course face price risks just like crop producers do.

Patterns Of Health Care Use Among Rural-Urban Medicare Beneficiaries Age 85 And Older, 2010-2017, Yvonne Jonk Phd, Heidi O'Connor Ms, Amanda Burgess Mppm, Carly Milkowski Mph

Access / Insurance

The purpose of this study was to examine rural-urban differences in health care use among Medicare beneficiaries age 85+. Understanding these differences, and the socioeconomic characteristics that contribute to them, can have important implications for Medicare policies aimed at serving the age 85+ population. Using the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey 2010-13 Cost and Use and 2015-17 Cost Supplement Files, we examined whether and how rural and urban Medicare beneficiaries age 85+ differ in terms of their:

1. socioeconomic and health characteristics that may inform health care use;
2. trends in health care use, including use of inpatient and emergency department (ED) care; …

The True Cost Of Auto Insurance In The Mountain West, 2022, Annie Vong, Saha Salahi, Caitlin J. Saladino, William E. Brown Jr.

Transportation & Infrastructure

This fact sheet examines data on average annual premiums, percent of income spent on auto insurance, and life events associated with the rising cost of auto insurance in the Mountain West (Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah). The original report includes data on national averages for auto insurance premiums for all fifty states.

Chapter: “Health Law And Ethics”, Allison K. Hoffman, I. Glenn Cohen, William M. Sage

All Faculty Scholarship

Law and ethics are both essential attributes of a high-functioning health care system and powerful explainers of why the existing system is so difficult to improve. U.S. health law is not seamless; rather, it derives from multiple sources and is based on various theories that may be in tension with one another. There are state laws and federal laws, laws setting standards and laws providing funding, laws reinforcing professional prerogatives, laws furthering social goals, and laws promoting market competition. Complying with law is important, but health professionals also should understand that the legal and ethical constraints under which health systems …

Terrorism Risk Insurance: Is It Really Working?, Rebecca Demarest

Honors Projects in Mathematics

This paper investigates terrorism risk insurance in the United States as well as those programs offered in other countries throughout the world. In the United States, particular attention is devoted to the interaction of government with private insurers to maintain an effective insurance program. An analysis is performed comparing terrorism insurance before and after the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. The paper looks into actual terrorist events that have occurred focusing on 56 world-wide events that are associated with property losses greater than $10 million. This paper not only investigates the losses that were incurred …

Toward Better Management Of Flood Losses: Flood Insurance In A Wetter World, Michael K. Mcshane, Juita-Elena (Wie) Yusuf

Finance Faculty Publications

Flood is the most frequent and costly of U.S. natural disasters with losses expected to increase due to climate change. The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) mandates flood insurance purchase for properties with federally backed mortgages in the 100-year floodplain. We propose that mandatory flood insurance purchase be extended to all property in the 500-year floodplain. Following flood events, payments would be directly provided for more properties that suffer flood loss, reducing federal disaster aid spending. The mandate could put more pressure on local governments to increase their Community Rating System score, such as through infrastructure investments and management practices …

Health Insurance Co-Ops: Product Availability And Premiums In Rural Counties, Erika C. Ziller Phd, Zachariah T. Croll Ba, Andrew F. Coburn Phd

Access / Insurance

Created by the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Consumer Operated and Oriented Plans (CO-OPs) are private, non-profit health insurers that were designed to increase insurance plan choice and lower premiums in the Health Insurance Marketplaces. Early analyses of the ACA suggested that CO-OPs may be particularly beneficial for rural communities, where fewer individual and small group health insurance options have traditionally been available.

This Research and Policy Brief, authored by research staff at the Maine Rural Health Research Center, explores the early availability and role of CO-OPs in rural and urban counties. We describe the regional distribution and market prevalence of …

An Appraisal Of The Actuaries’ Climate Risk Index, Stephen Lee Kolk

May 18, 2016: The Economic Impacts of Sea-Level Rise in Hampton Roads

PDF of powerpoint presentation given at the workshop "The Economic Impacts of Sea-Level Rise in Hampton Roads: An Appraisal of the Projects Underway" on May 18, 2016 at the Virginia Modeling and Simulation Center, 1030 University Blvd, Suffolk, VA 23435

Rural Disabled Medicare Beneficiaries Spend More Out-Of-Pocket Than Their Urban Counterparts, Erika C. Ziller Phd, Jennifer D. Lenardson Mhs, Andrew F. Coburn Phd

Access / Insurance

The majority of Medicare beneficiaries experience gaps between the care they need and costs covered by Medicare and seek supplemental coverage to meet this gap, including private plans offered by former employers or purchased individually, or public coverage through Medicaid. Since rural beneficiaries are more likely to purchase supplemental indemnity coverage individually, to participate in Medicaid, or to go without supplemental coverage altogether, it is likely that their out-of-pocket spending differs from that of urban residents, although the magnitude and direction of these differences may vary for individual beneficiaries. This study used data from the 2006-2010 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey …

Disparities In Hospital Services Utilization Among Patients With Mental Health Issues: A Statewide Example Examining Insurance Status And Race Factors From 1999-2010, Viann N. Nguyen-Feng, Hind A. Beydoun, Michael K. Mcshane, James D. Blando

Community & Environmental Health Faculty Publications

There exist many disconnects between the mental and general health care sectors. However, a goal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010 is to change this by improving insurance access and the intersection of mental and general health care. As insurance status intersects with race, the present study examines how race, insurance status, and hospital mental health services utilization differ across groups within the state of New Jersey. The present study aims to determine trends in hospital mental health care utilization by insurance status and race from 1999 to 2010. The rate of self-pay for mental health disorders in …

Rural Implications Of Medicaid Expansion Under The Affordable Care Act, Erika C. Ziller Phd, Jennifer D. Lenardson Mhs, Andrew F. Coburn Phd

Medicaid

In this brief, researchers from the Maine Rural Health Research Center (University of Southern Maine, Muskie School of Public Service) present findings from a SHARE-funded evaluation of the rural implications of Medicaid expansion under the ACA.

The authors examine the following issues:

• The extent to which prior public health insurance expansions have covered rural populations
• Whether rural residents who are expected to be newly eligible for Medicaid in 2014 differ from their urban counterparts
• The extent to which rural individuals might differentially benefit from the ACA Medicaid expansion in light of the expansion becoming optional
• Whether rural enrollees are likely …

Navigating The Health Care Labyrinth: Portraits Of The Socioeconomically Disadvantaged, Thomas C. Crawford Phd

Antioch University Full-Text Dissertations & Theses

In 2010, an estimated population of the 311,212,863 Americans generated approximately 1,014,688,290 physician office encounters (Moore, 2010). The frequency and number of professional interactions between caregivers and patients/family members in medical office settings equated to a staggering 1,931 visits per minute. Based on the massive volume of interactions that occurred between patients of different races, ethnicities, genders, sexual orientations, and socioeconomic standings that generated an average household income of $49,445 in 2010 (United States Census Bureau, 2010a) with a physician workforce that the Association of American Medical Colleges (2010) captured as being 75% White that earned (primary care specialties) in …

Can Consumers Make Affordable Care Affordable? The Value Of Choice Architecture, Eric J. Johnson, Ran Hassin, Tom Baker, Allison T. Bajger, Galen Treuer

All Faculty Scholarship

Starting this October, tens of millions will be choosing health coverage on a state or federal health insurance exchange as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. We examine how well people make these choices, how well they think they do, and what can be done to improve these choices. We conducted 6 experiments asking people to choose the most cost-effective policy using websites modeled on current exchanges. Our results suggest there is significant room for improvement. Without interventions, respondents perform at near chance levels and show a significant bias, overweighting out-of-pocket expenses and deductibles. Financial incentives do …

Improving Health Outcomes For Children (Ihoc): Summary Of Pediatric Quality Measures For Children Enrolled In Mainecare Ffy 2009 - Ffy 2012, Nathaniel J. Anderson Ms, Mph, Tracey Meagher

Population Health & Health Policy

his report, authored by USM Muskie School research staff, presents the results of the 16 CHIPRA Core Measures that were collected using MaineCare claims or Vital Statistics data and reported in the State of Maine’s FFY 2012 CHIP Annual Report to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Also included in this report are an additional three measures from the Improving Health Outcomes for Children (IHOC) project’s Master List of Pediatric Measures. In addition to presenting results in graphs and narrative, this report also provides measure definitions and background information about each measure topic.

The goal of this document …

Global Budgets, Payment Reform And Single Payer: Understanding Vemont's Health Reform, Trish Riley

Population Health & Health Policy

The Muskie School of Public Service hosted two health policy colloquia this April to promote informed discussion throughout the state regarding MaineCare coverage options under the ACA and the implications of Vermont’s move toward a single-payer system.The series, sponsored by the Muskie School Board of Visitors, offers community conversations in which experts from various disciplines and perspectives inform and engage the broader public to explore and debate critical policy issues. On April 22, community and sector leaders joined for Global Budgets, Payment Reform, and Single Payer: Understanding Vermont's Health Reform. Participants discussed Vermont's recent movie toward single payer health …

Examining Mainecare’S Coverage Options Under The Affordable Care Act, Erika C. Ziller Phd, Trish Riley

Population Health & Health Policy

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was designed to achieve nearly universal access to health coverage in the United States—in part by standardizing Medicaid eligibility across the country so that each state’s program would cover individuals with incomes below 138% of the federal poverty level (FPL), or $15,856 for an individual and $32,499 for a family of four in 2013 (see Figure 1).i However, in June 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that states could not be required to broaden Medicaid and retained the decision as a state option. States that choose to participate may do so by amending their state …

Federal Health Care Reform: An Overview, Andrew F. Coburn Phd

Population Health & Health Policy

This policy brief discusses three of the main components of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as "Obamacare". These components are helath insurance coverage, delivery system improvement, and cost containment. The policy brief highlights some of the provision of the law that have already been implemented and those where importnat implementation decisions will have to be made. The brief is authored by Dr. Andrew Coburn, PhD, Professor of Public Health and Director of the Population Health and Health Policy program at the USM Muskie School, and was presented at the Maine Policy Leaders Academy Health Care …

Report On Collaboration Of Dr. Diane Horn With Dr. Michael Mcshane As Part Of The Climate Change And Sea Level Rise Initiative, Diane Horn, Michael K. Mcshane

CCSLRI Reports

No abstract provided.

Insurance In Sociolegal Research, Tom Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

Insurance has a long history in sociolegal research, most prominently as a window on accident compensation and related tort law in action. Recent work has extended that research, with the result that tort law in action may be the best mapped of any legal field outside criminal law. Sociological research has begun to explore insurance as a form of governance, with effects in many legal fields and across the economy. This essay reviews developments in both bodies of work. Part one examines the relationship between liability insurance and tort law in action using the metaphors of window and frame. Part …

The Utility Of Trouble: Leveling The Playing Field: Giving Municipal Officials The Tools To Moderate Health Insurance Costs, Robert L. Carey

Edward J. Collins Center for Public Management Publications

According to the research, Boston could have reduced its 2010 health premiums by between 15.6 and 17.1 percent, for a savings of between $41.4 and $45.4 million by joining the state’s Group Insurance Commission, more widely known as the GIC. The City is unable to join the GIC, however, without first receiving 70% union approval, according to state law. This requirement and the associated tradeoffs involved are a major barrier to municipal participation in the GIC. Several cities and towns including Boston have called for cities and towns to have the same ability as the state to design health insurance …

Tontines For The Invincibles: Enticing Low Risks Into The Health-Insurance Pool With An Idea From Insurance History And Behavioral Economics, Tom Baker, Peter Siegelman

All Faculty Scholarship

Over one third of the uninsured adults in the U.S. below retirement age are between 19 and 29 years old. Young adults, especially men, often go without insurance, even when buying it is mandatory and sometimes even when it is a low cost employment benefit. This paper proposes a new form of health insurance targeted at this group—the “Young Invincibles”—those who (wrongly) believe that they don’t need health insurance because they won’t get sick. Our proposal offers a cash bonus to those who turn out to be right in their belief that they did not really need health insurance. The …

Controlling The Cost Of Municipal Health Insurance: Lessons From Springfield, Robert L. Carey

Edward J. Collins Center for Public Management Publications

The study finds that, by joining the Group Insurance Commission (GIC), Springfield cut increases in its health care costs an estimated $14 million to $18 million over two years. It saved an additional $5 million per year by requiring eligible municipal retirees to enroll in Medicare Part B as a precondition of receiving supplemental health coverage from the City. These two actions, together, reduced increases in the City’s health care costs an estimated 15-19% annually, on average, with savings growth each year due to compounding. Furthermore, the study estimates that if the GIC continues its past pattern of keeping its …

The Effects Of Tort Reform On Medical Malpractice Insurers’ Ultimate Losses, Patricia Born, W. Kip Viscusi, Tom Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

Whereas the literature evaluating the effect of tort reforms has focused on reported incurred losses, this paper examines the long run effects using a comprehensive sample by state of individual firms writing medical malpractice insurance from 1984-2003. The long run effects of reforms are greater than insurers' expected effects, as five year developed losses and ten year developed losses are below the initially reported incurred losses for those years following reform measures. The quantile regressions show the greatest effects of joint and several liability limits, noneconomic damages caps, and punitive damages reforms for the firms that are at the high …

Embracing Risk, Sharing Responsibility, Tom Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Insurance Against Misinformation In The Securities Market, Tom Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

Prepared at the request of the Task Force to Modernize Securities Legislation in Canada, this study describes and evaluates evaluate a new capital markets insurance concept: securities misinformation insurance. This new insurance would compensate investors for losses caused by securities law violations. The most powerful objection to this new concept is that investors do not need a new insurance program for securities misinformation losses. Individual and institutional investors already can spread securities misinformation losses by holding a diversified portfolio. Nevertheless, a securities misinformation insurance program has the potential to provide systemic benefits: improved compliance with securities laws (resulting from cost …

Containing The Promise Of Insurance: Adverse Selection And Risk Classification, Tom Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

Insurance law, risk pools, adverse selection

Brief 14: Risk Management, New England Resource Center For Higher Education, University Of Massachusetts Boston

New England Resource Center for Higher Education Publications

The development office accepts a gift of a house from a prestigious donor. The faculty has developed and approved a new core curriculum. The institution recently constructed a new campus center. While these circumstances sound no alarms, all involve elements of risk. The welcome gift of the house, later discovered to be contaminated with mold, will involve a costly clean up. A revised curriculum cannot guarantee that the changes will yield the expected results. The construction of a new building has significant implications for maintenance of the physical plant. In a recent meeting NERCHE’s Chief Financial Officers Think Tank discussed …

An Inquiry Into The Efficiency Of The Limited Liability Company: Of Theory Of The Firm And Regulatory Competition, William W. Bratton, Joseph A. Mccahery

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Reducing Moral Hazard In Deposit Insurance : A Policy Instrument For Generating Regulatory Information, Chengze, Simon Fan

Centre for Public Policy Studies : CPPS Working Paper Series

No abstract provided.

Is Equal Access The Prescription For Equity?, Victor Sidel, Dorothy E. Roberts, Jennifer Dohrn, Kathy Anastos, Nitza Milagros Escalera, Peter Holland, Sylvia Kleinman, Sylvia Law, Jack O'Sullivan, Robert Padgug, Dennis Rivera, Beth Weitzman

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.