Did the unification of commercial and investment banking heighten risk in financial markets due to moral hazard of borrowers? In a simple intertemporal model with moral hazard and uninsured risk, we argue that if financial contracts are properly written, the integration in financial markets could give rise to greater risk sharing arrangement and could eliminate the equity risk premium attribute...

This paper studies how insurance coverage policies impact pharmaceutical innovation. In the United States, most patients obtain prescription drugs through plans administered by Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs). Beginning in 2012, PBMs began refusing to provide for many newly approved when cheaper alternatives were available. We document a shift R&D strategies after this policy took effect: ...

We provide predictions for DSGE models with incomplete information that are robust across structures. Our approach maps an incomplete-information model into a full-information economy time-varying expectation wedges and provides conditions ensure the rationalizable by some structure. Using our approach, we quantify potential importance of as source business cycle fluctuations in otherwise frict...

We present a model of life-insurance purchase that takes into account the age of the beneficiary. The beneficiaries considered herein are young children with no resources whose consumption needs are protected by purchasing life insurance if the breadwinner dies. We show that income transfer grows as the child ages; however, the size of contingent bequest shrinks because the need for protection ...

Indemnifying smallholder farmers against crop loss is thought to be infeasible due to information problems. Consequently there is interest in developing alternative, partial, insurance products. Examples include rainfall insurance and the limited liability inherent in credit contracts. I argue that while these products may reduce information asymmetry, ambiguity averse farmers struggle to asses...

Compared with non-union workers, union workers take more of their compensation in the form of insurance. This may be because unions choose democratically, and democratic choice mitigates adverse selection in group insurance. Relative to individually-purchased insurance, we show that group insurance chosen by an ideal profit-maximizing employer can be worse for every employee, while group insura...

We analyze recent contributions to growth theory based on the model of expanding variety of Romer (1990). In the first part, we present different versions of the benchmark linear model with imperfect competition. These include the “labequipment” model, “labor-for-intermediates” and “directed technical change”. We review applications of the expanding variety framework to the analysis of internat...

Rothschild and Stiglitz (1976) demonstrated that adverse selection may entail nonexistence of equilibrium in competitive insurance markets. We approach this problem in a dynamic model with boundedly rational insurance rms. Firms' behavior is based on imitation of pro t making contracts, withdrawal of loss making contracts, and experimentation with random contracts. Consumers choose in each peri...

This paper investigates the impact of demographic shocks on optimal decisions about saving, life insurance, and, most centrally, asset allocation. The analysis indicates that marital-status transitions can have important effects on optimal household decisions, particularly in the cases of widowhood and divorce. Children also play a fundamental role in portfolio choice; in addition to leading to...