Somebody's watching me! Impacts of the spot check list program in <scp>U.S.</scp> crop insurance

The “Spot Check List” (SCL) is an important tool developed to help detect and deter fraud, waste, abuse in the U.S. crop insurance program. This article examines whether SCL program affects extent of losses provides insights into effectiveness this Using proprietary, county-level data panel econometric procedures (which control for both observable unobservable confounding factors), we find evidence that counties with more producers included tend have better actuarial performance (i.e., lower indemnity payment amounts) after these are informed about their listing on SCL. In addition, effects last a couple years beyond initial year were listing. These results indicate procedure has notable impact valuable maintaining integrity