Data and Code for: Health Insurance Design Meets Saving Incentives: Consumer Responses to Complex Contracts

Principal Investigator(s):  View help for Principal Investigator(s) Adam Leive, University of Virginia

Version:  View help for Version V1

Name File Type Size Last Modified
  replication 05/06/2021 01:52:PM
Online Appendix.pdf application/pdf 834.5 KB 05/06/2021 09:52:AM
README.pdf application/pdf 53.1 KB 05/06/2021 09:42:AM

Project Citation: 

Leive, Adam. Data and Code for: Health Insurance Design Meets Saving Incentives: Consumer Responses to Complex Contracts. Nashville, TN: American Economic Association [publisher], 2022. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2022-03-21. https://doi.org/10.3886/E129302V1

Project Description

Summary:  View help for Summary
To lower health care costs, Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) offer tax incentives encouraging people to trade off current consumption against future consumption. This paper tests whether consumers use HSAs as self-insurance over their life-cycle. Using administrative data from a large employer and a regression discontinuity design, I estimate the marginal propensity to consume from HSA assets is 0.85 and reject the neoclassical benchmark of zero. Comparisons with 401(k) saving show most employees do not treat HSA money as fungible with retirement savings. In this setting, HSAs did not reduce health spending and instead increased the share that was financed tax-free.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms Life-Cycle Modeling; Regression Discontinuity
JEL Classification:  View help for JEL Classification
      D14 Household Saving; Personal Finance
      D81 Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
      G22 Insurance; Insurance Companies; Actuarial Studies
      H51 National Government Expenditures and Health
      I13 Health Insurance, Public and Private
Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage United States
Time Period(s):  View help for Time Period(s) 2006 – 2010
Data Type(s):  View help for Data Type(s) administrative records data; observational data


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V1 [2022-03-21]

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