title: Optimal cost reimbursement of health insurers to reduce risk selection.
abstract: In the absence of a perfect risk adjustment scheme, reimbursing health insurers' costs can reduce risk selection in community-rated health insurance markets. In this paper, we develop a model in which insurers determine the cost efficiency of health care and have incentives for risk selection. We derive the optimal cost reimbursement function, which balances the incentives for cost efficiency and risk selection. For health cost data from a Swiss health insurer, we find that an optimal cost reimbursement scheme should reimburse costs only up to a threshold.
authors.affiliation: Department of Economics, University of Augsburg, Augsburg, Germany. Mathias.Kifmann@wiwi.uni-augsburg.de
authors.forename: Mathias
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kifmann
authors.forename: Normann
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Lorenz
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D017598:Efficiency, Organizational; D005102:Health Expenditures / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D017722:Hospital Charges / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D007343:Insurance Carriers / Q000191:economics*; D007348:Insurance, Health / Q000191:economics*; D018803:Models, Economic; D012052:Reimbursement, Incentive / Q000191:economics*; D020379:Risk Adjustment / Q000379:methods*; D012737:Sex Factors