IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/genrir/v29y2004i1p23-41.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Cream Skimming, Dregs Skimming, and Pooling: On the Dynamics of Competitive Screening

Author

Listed:
  • Diderik Lund

    (Department of Economics, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1095 Blindern, N-0317 Oslo, Norway, e-mail: diderik.lund@econ.uio.no)

  • Tore Nilssen

    (Department of Economics, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1095 Blindern, N-0317 Oslo, Norway, e-mail: tore.nilssen@econ.uio.no)

Abstract

We discuss the existence of a pooling equilibrium in a two-period model of an insurance market with asymmetric information. We solve the model numerically. We pay particular attention to the reasons for non-existence in cases where no pooling equilibrium exists. In addition to the phenomenon of cream skimming emphasized in earlier literature, we here point to the importance of the opposite: dregs skimming, whereby high-risk consumers are profitably detracted from the candidate pooling contract. The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance Theory (2004) 29, 23–41. doi:10.1023/B:GEPA.0000032564.19797.21

Suggested Citation

  • Diderik Lund & Tore Nilssen, 2004. "Cream Skimming, Dregs Skimming, and Pooling: On the Dynamics of Competitive Screening," The Geneva Risk and Insurance Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association for the Study of Insurance Economics (The Geneva Association), vol. 29(1), pages 23-41, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:genrir:v:29:y:2004:i:1:p:23-41
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.palgrave-journals.com/grir/journal/v29/n1/pdf/grir2004162a.pdf
    File Function: Link to full text PDF
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: http://www.palgrave-journals.com/grir/journal/v29/n1/full/grir2004162a.html
    File Function: Link to full text HTML
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dionne, Georges & Doherty, Neil A, 1994. "Adverse Selection, Commitment, and Renegotiation: Extension to and Evidence from Insurance Markets," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(2), pages 209-235, April.
    2. Parigi, Bruno M., 1994. "Self selection in a dynamic credit model," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 571-590, October.
    3. Szpiro, George G, 1986. "Measuring Risk Aversion: An Alternative Approach," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 68(1), pages 156-159, February.
    4. Asheim, Geir B. & Nilssen, Tore, 1996. "Non-discriminating renegotiation in a competitive insurance market," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 40(9), pages 1717-1736, December.
    5. Nilssen, Tore, 2000. "Consumer lock-in with asymmetric information," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 18(4), pages 641-666, May.
    6. Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1977. "Monopoly, Non-linear Pricing and Imperfect Information: The Insurance Market," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 44(3), pages 407-430.
    7. 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.
    8. Jean-Jacques Laffont & Jean Tirole, 1993. "A Theory of Incentives in Procurement and Regulation," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262121743, December.
    9. Tirole, Jean, 1986. "Procurement and Renegotiation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(2), pages 235-259, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jobst, Andreas A., 2002. "The Pricing puzzle: The default term structure of collateralised loan obligations," CFS Working Paper Series 2002/14, Center for Financial Studies (CFS).
    2. Andreas Jobst, 2002. "Loan Securitisation: Default Term Structure and Asset Pricing Based on Loss Prioritisation," FMG Discussion Papers dp422, Financial Markets Group.

    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. 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.
    2. Nilssen, Tore, 2000. "Consumer lock-in with asymmetric information," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 18(4), pages 641-666, May.
    3. Dionne, Georges & Fluet, Claude, 1999. "Full Pooling in Multi-Period Contracting with Adverse Selection and Noncommitment," Working Papers 99-4, HEC Montreal, Canada Research Chair in Risk Management.
    4. Espen R. Moen & Åsa Rosén, 2005. "Performance Pay and Adverse Selection," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 107(2), pages 279-298, June.
    5. Dionne, Georges & Fombaron, Nathalie & Doherty, Neil, 2012. "Adverse selection in insurance contracting," Working Papers 12-8, HEC Montreal, Canada Research Chair in Risk Management.
    6. Dionne, Georges & Harrington, Scott, 2017. "Insurance and Insurance Markets," Working Papers 17-2, HEC Montreal, Canada Research Chair in Risk Management.
    7. Larry A. Cox & Yanling Ge, 2004. "Temporal Profitability and Pricing of Long‐Term Care Insurance," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 71(4), pages 677-705, December.
    8. Georges Dionne & Claude Fluet, 2000. "original papers : Full pooling in multi-period contracting with adverse selection and noncommitment," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 5(1), pages 1-21.
    9. Georges Dionne & Casey G. Rothschild, 2011. "Risk Classification in Insurance Contracting," Cahiers de recherche 1137, CIRPEE.
    10. Asheim, Geir B. & Nilssen, Tore, 1996. "Non-discriminating renegotiation in a competitive insurance market," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 40(9), pages 1717-1736, December.
    11. Giuseppe, DE FEO & Jean, HINDRIKS, 2005. "Efficiency of Competition in Insurance Markets with Adverse Selection," Discussion Papers (ECON - Département des Sciences Economiques) 2005042, Université catholique de Louvain, Département des Sciences Economiques.
    12. Georges Dionne & Casey Rothschild, 2014. "Economic Effects of Risk Classification Bans," The Geneva Risk and Insurance Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association for the Study of Insurance Economics (The Geneva Association), vol. 39(2), pages 184-221, September.
    13. Marco Battaglini, 2005. "Long-Term Contracting with Markovian Consumers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 637-658, June.
    14. Willington Manuel & Alegría Alexander, 2012. "Collusion in a One-Period Insurance Market with Adverse Selection," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-32, April.
    15. Mouhamadou FALL & Anne LAVIGNE, 2006. "Multiperiod Health Insurance Contracts & Bayesian Updating of Beliefs," LEO Working Papers / DR LEO 1263, Orleans Economics Laboratory / Laboratoire d'Economie d'Orleans (LEO), University of Orleans.
    16. Vitor Farinha Luz, 2022. "Optimal dynamic insurance contracts," Papers 2208.14560, arXiv.org.
    17. Alma Cohen, 2012. "Asymmetric Learning in Repeated Contracting: An Empirical Study," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(2), pages 419-432, May.
    18. Dosis, Anastasios, 2019. "Optimal ex post risk adjustment in markets with adverse selection," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 52-59.
    19. Georges Dionne & Nathalie Fombaron & Wanda Mimra, 2025. "Adverse Selection in Insurance," Springer Books, in: Georges Dionne (ed.), Handbook of Insurance, edition 0, pages 165-221, Springer.
    20. Peng Shi & Wei Zhang, 2016. "A Test of Asymmetric Learning in Competitive Insurance With Partial Information Sharing," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 83(3), pages 557-578, September.

    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
    • L14 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Transactional Relationships; Contracts and Reputation

    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:pal:genrir:v:29:y:2004:i:1:p:23-41. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.palgrave-journals.com/ .

    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.