IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aecrev/v97y2007i5p1994-2004.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Overconfidence, Insurance, and Paternalism

Author

Listed:
  • Alvaro Sandroni
  • Francesco Squintani

Abstract

It is well known that when agents are fully rational, compulsory public insurance may make all agents better off in the Rothschild and Stiglitz (1976) model of insurance markets. We find that when sufficiently many agents underestimate their personal risks, compulsory insurance makes low-risk agents worse off. Hence, behavioral biases may weaken some of the well-established rationales for government intervention based on asymmetric information. (JEL D82, G22)

Suggested Citation

  • Alvaro Sandroni & Francesco Squintani, 2007. "Overconfidence, Insurance, and Paternalism," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(5), pages 1994-2004, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:97:y:2007:i:5:p:1994-2004
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.97.5.1994
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/aer.97.5.1994
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/aer/data/dec07/20051082_app.pdf
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Paul Heidhues & Botond Köszegi, 2004. "The Impact of Consumer Loss Aversion on Pricing," CIG Working Papers SP II 2004-17, Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin (WZB), Research Unit: Competition and Innovation (CIG).
    2. Xavier Gabaix & David Laibson, 2018. "Shrouded attributes, consumer myopia and information suppression in competitive markets," Chapters, in: Victor J. Tremblay & Elizabeth Schroeder & Carol Horton Tremblay (ed.), Handbook of Behavioral Industrial Organization, chapter 3, pages 40-74, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    3. Muhamet Yildiz, 2003. "Bargaining without a Common Prior-An Immediate Agreement Theorem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(3), pages 793-811, May.
    4. Shlomo Benartzi, 2001. "Excessive Extrapolation and the Allocation of 401(k) Accounts to Company Stock," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(5), pages 1747-1764, October.
    5. B. Dahlby, 1981. "Adverse selection and Pareto improvements through compulsory insurance," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 37(3), pages 547-558, January.
    6. Michael Rothschild & Joseph Stiglitz, 1976. "Equilibrium in Competitive Insurance Markets: An Essay on the Economics of Imperfect Information," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 90(4), pages 629-649.
    7. Michael Manove & A. Jorge Padilla, 1999. "Banking (Conservatively) with Optimists," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 30(2), pages 324-350, Summer.
    8. Linda Babcock & George Loewenstein, 1997. "Explaining Bargaining Impasse: The Role of Self-Serving Biases," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 11(1), pages 109-126, Winter.
    9. Thesmar, David & Landier, Augustin, 2003. "Financial Contracting with Optimistic Entrepreneurs: Theory and Evidence," CEPR Discussion Papers 3971, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    10. Luís Santos-Pinto & Joel Sobel, 2005. "A Model of Positive Self-Image in Subjective Assessments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(5), pages 1386-1402, December.
    11. Ted O'Donoghue & Matthew Rabin, 2003. "Studying Optimal Paternalism, Illustrated by a Model of Sin Taxes," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(2), pages 186-191, May.
    12. Roland Bénabou & Jean Tirole, 2005. "Self-Confidence and Personal Motivation," International Economic Association Series, in: Bina Agarwal & Alessandro Vercelli (ed.), Psychology, Rationality and Economic Behaviour, chapter 2, pages 19-57, Palgrave Macmillan.
    13. Wilson, Charles, 1977. "A model of insurance markets with incomplete information," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 167-207, December.
    14. ,, 2006. "Competition over agents with boundedly rational expectations," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 1(2), pages 207-231, June.
    15. Pradeep Dubey & John Geanakoplos, 2002. "Competitive Pooling: Rothschild-Stiglitz Reconsidered," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(4), pages 1529-1570.
    16. Mark V. Pauly, 1994. "Universal Health Insurance in the Clinton Plan: Coverage as a Tax-Financed Public Good," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 8(3), pages 45-53, Summer.
    17. Dan Lovallo & Colin Camerer, 1999. "Overconfidence and Excess Entry: An Experimental Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(1), pages 306-318, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sandroni, Alvaro & Squintani, Francesco, 2013. "Overconfidence and asymmetric information: The case of insurance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 149-165.
    2. Julio J. Rotemberg, 2010. "A Behavioral Model of Demandable Deposits and its Implications for Financial Regulation," NBER Working Papers 16620, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Stefano DellaVigna, 2009. "Psychology and Economics: Evidence from the Field," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(2), pages 315-372, June.
    4. Arni, Patrick & Dragone, Davide & Goette, Lorenz & Ziebarth, Nicolas R., 2021. "Biased health perceptions and risky health behaviors—Theory and evidence," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    5. Guy Mayraz, 2011. "Wishful Thinking," CEP Discussion Papers dp1092, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    6. Attar, Andrea & Mariotti, Thomas & Salanié, François, 2014. "Multiple Contracting in Insurance Markets," IDEI Working Papers 839, Institut d'Économie Industrielle (IDEI), Toulouse, revised Sep 2016.
    7. Jeremy Clark & Lana Friesen, 2009. "Overconfidence in Forecasts of Own Performance: An Experimental Study," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(534), pages 229-251, January.
    8. Dosis, Anastasios, 2019. "Optimal ex post risk adjustment in markets with adverse selection," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 52-59.
    9. Dionne, G. & Doherty, N., 1991. "Adverse Selection In Insurance Markets: A Selective Survey," Cahiers de recherche 9105, Centre interuniversitaire de recherche en économie quantitative, CIREQ.
    10. Johannes Johnen, 2019. "Automatic‐renewal contracts with heterogeneous consumer inertia," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(4), pages 765-786, November.
    11. Benoît, Jean-Pierre & Dubra, Juan, 2007. "Overconfidence?," MPRA Paper 6017, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Nov 2007.
    12. De Feo, Giuseppe & Hindriks, Jean, 2014. "Harmful competition in insurance markets," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 213-226.
    13. de la Rosa, Leonidas Enrique, 2011. "Overconfidence and moral hazard," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 429-451.
    14. Daniel McFadden & Carlos Noton & Pau Olivella, "undated". "Remedies for Sick Insurance," Working Papers 620, Barcelona School of Economics.
    15. King-King Li, 2022. "Memory Recall Bias of Overconfident and Underconfident Individuals after Feedback," Post-Print hal-03841235, HAL.
    16. Michael Grubb, 2015. "Failing to Choose the Best Price: Theory, Evidence, and Policy," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 47(3), pages 303-340, November.
    17. Joshua S. Gans & Stephen P. King, 2003. "Anti‐insurance: Analysing the Health Insurance System in Australia," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 79(247), pages 473-486, December.
    18. von Siemens, Ferdinand A. & Kosfeld, Michael, 2014. "Team production in competitive labor markets with adverse selection," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 181-198.
    19. Dosis, Anastasios, 2018. "On signalling and screening in markets with asymmetric information," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 140-149.
    20. Georges Dionne & Casey G. Rothschild, 2011. "Risk Classification in Insurance Contracting," Cahiers de recherche 1137, CIRPEE.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • G22 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Insurance; Insurance Companies; Actuarial Studies

    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:97:y:2007:i:5:p:1994-2004. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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.