By Jeffrey R. Brown, Jeffrey R. Kling, Sendhil Mullainathan, and Marian V. Wrobel* annuity
markets, including the absence of inflation protection, the inability to insure against medical …

Consumers need information to compare alternatives for markets to function efficiently.
Recognizing this, public policies often pair competition with easy access to comparative …

The evidence presented in this paper supports the basic theoretical presumption that state
and local governments cannot redistribute income. Since individuals can avoid unfavorable …

We provide evidence that individuals optimize imperfectly when making annuity decisions,
and this result is not driven by loss aversion. Life annuities are more attractive when …

Choices increasingly abound for various government-supported services, ranging from
charter schools to health plans. 24 million elderly Americans have enrolled in Medicare Part D …

MCBS data are used to analyze the predictability of drug expenditures by Medicare
beneficiaries. Predictors include demographic characteristics and measures of health status, the …

BACKGROUND:: It is widely believed that appropriate use of prescription medicines can
reduce avoidable hospitalizations and more expensive nonpharmacologic therapies, but …

Objective. To assess whether gaining prescription drug coverage produces cost offsets in
Medicare spending on inpatient and physician services. Data Source. Two‐year panels …

This paper addresses the question of whether prescription drug coverage for Medicare
beneficiaries is associated with lower spending for hospital and physician services. We discuss …

High-risk pools are State programs that were recently brought under Federal review by the
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). For a subsidized, yet …