IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aecrev/v105y2015i1p204-33.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Paying Attention or Paying Too Much in Medicare Part D

Author

Listed:
  • Jonathan D. Ketcham
  • Claudio Lucarelli
  • Christopher A. Powers

Abstract

We study whether people became less likely to switch Medicare prescription drug plans (PDPs) due to more options and more time in Part D. Panel data for a random 20 percent sample of enrollees from 2006-2010 show that 50 percent were not in their original PDPs by 2010. Individuals switched PDPs in response to higher costs of their status quo plans, saving them money. Contrary to choice overload, larger choice sets increased switching unless the additional plans were relatively expensive. Neither switching overall nor responsiveness to costs declined over time, and above-minimum spending in 2010 remained below the 2006 and 2007 levels. (JEL H51, I13, I18)

Suggested Citation

  • Jonathan D. Ketcham & Claudio Lucarelli & Christopher A. Powers, 2015. "Paying Attention or Paying Too Much in Medicare Part D," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(1), pages 204-233, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:105:y:2015:i:1:p:204-33
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.20120651
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/aer.20120651
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/aer/app/10501/20120651_app.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/aer/data/10501/20120651_data.zip
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/aer/ds/10501/20120651_ds.zip
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    ---><---

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H51 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Government Expenditures and Health
    • I13 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Insurance, Public and Private
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:105:y:2015:i:1:p:204-33. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.