Study On The Influence Of Urban-Rural Income Gap On Health Insurance Needs Under Demographic Changes

Although China’s commercial health insurance started late,with the social and economic progress,its development speed is accelerating and the quality of development is improving.And the government has continuously implemented corresponding policies to promote the development of commercial health insurance,which has created a favorable policy environment for commercial health insurance.However,the development of health insurance in China is still lagging behind foreign countries,and the demographic changes such as urban-rural income gap,aging,urbanization and education development make China’s health insurance market face many opportunities and challenges.Therefore,this paper studies the impact of urban-rural income disparity on the demand for health insurance in China against the background of demographic changes.From domestic and international studies,few domestic researchers have focused on the impact of urban-rural income disparity on health insurance demand,and there are few empirical studies on the joint impact of urban-rural income disparity and demographic changes and other factors on health insurance demand.Therefore,based on the existing studies,this paper draws research conclusions through theoretical analysis,current situation analysis and empirical analysis,and puts forward relevant suggestions.In the theoretical analysis part,it integrates the income theory,firstly,the mathematical derivation with the absolute income theory,and gets that the urban-rural income gap has an impact on the demand for health insurance,but the positive and negative effects cannot be determined,therefore,the research hypothesis that the urban-rural income gap affects the demand for health insurance;then the urban-rural dual structure is incorporated into the relative income theory for the impact path research,and the analysis from the income source and consumption psychology finds that the income The urbanrural income gap will increase the demand for health insurance of urban residents and decrease the demand for health insurance of rural residents,so the research hypothesis is proposed: the urban-rural income gap will affect the demand for health insurance consumption by reducing the health care expenditure of rural residents;the urban-rural income gap will affect the demand for health insurance consumption by increasing the health care expenditure of urban residents.The urban-rural income gap will affect health insurance consumption demand by increasing urban residents’ health care expenditure.In the part of analysis of the current situation,it analyzes the current situation of health insurance development,urban-rural income gap and demographic changes in China,and finds that health insurance in China is developing more and more in the insurance industry in terms of demand level,but there is still the problem of serious homogenization of single demand products in terms of demand structure.And from them,key indicators are selected as the main research variables for the empirical analysis of this paper,with health insurance density measuring health insurance demand as the explanatory variable,Thiel index measuring urban-rural income gap as the core explanatory variable,and aging level,education level and urbanization level as the main explanatory variables for the demographic change factors.In the empirical analysis part,it uses panel data to build a fixed-effects model,and the study finds that there is indeed a relationship between urban-rural income gap and health insurance demand,and it is a positive relationship,which confirms the research hypothesis in the above paper.Without considering the demographic changes,an increase of 1 unit in urban-rural income gap increases the health insurance density by 48.4% on average;while the increase of education level will expand the positive effect of urban-rural income gap on health insurance demand,and the level of urbanization and industrial structure upgrading will weaken the positive effect of urban-rural income gap on health insurance demand.The analysis finds that the widening of urban-rural income gap promotes the health insurance demand of urban residents,but suppresses the health insurance demand of rural residents,which confirms the research hypothesis above,and the promotion effect is greater than the suppression effect,and explains why there is a positive effect of the widening of urban-rural income gap on health insurance demand.The results of the robustness analysis of the benchmark model are significant,which proves the robustness of the empirical results of this paper.The heterogeneity analysis of the grouped regressions next reveals that the effect of urban-rural income gap on health insurance demand is significant only in the central region,but not in the eastern and western regions,mainly because the trend of the core variables in the central region is consistent with the national average.Finally,summarizing the results of the current situation analysis and empirical analysis above,we get that the health insurance demand market still has the problems of homogenization and product homogeneity,and the contradiction of aging society has intensified the demand for health insurance,but the low-quality urbanization development has reduced the demand for health insurance,and the positive effect brought by the widening urban-rural income gap is monstrously short-lived,and only by narrowing the urban-rural income gap can the demand for health insurance be increased continuously It is concluded that the demand for health insurance can be increased by improving farmers’ education level,etc.Therefore,it proposes suggestions from two perspectives of insurance companies and government respectively: firstly,insurance companies should segment the market,innovate health insurance products to meet the needs of different people;improve their operation,pay attention to health insurance publicity and optimize the insurance claim process;strengthen management,deepen the health management market and improve the social security function.Secondly,the government should actively support and guide the development of commercial health insurance;create a favorable environment for the development of commercial health insurance;improve the quality of urbanization development by focusing on people;reasonably allocate education resources and increase the investment in the cause.