| This dissertation provides international and U.S. specific perspective on the far reaching influence of the private health insurance market. The first essay posits that the private health insurance market creates incentives which influence intermediate healthcare infrastructure components which ultimately influence health outcomes. Using panel data from multiple OECD countries, the results of univariate, multivariate, and DEA analyses all provide evidence that the private health insurance market has a positive influence on the relation between healthcare infrastructure components and health outcomes. The second essay examines the hypothesis that private health insurance market operations influences medical malpractice insurance market operations and vice versa. The analysis in the second essay, which utilizes panel data from various sources such as the NAIC, U.S. Census Bureau, and the CDC, indicates that higher levels of private health insurance losses are associated with lower levels of medical malpractice insurance losses. Further, higher levels of medical malpractice insurance losses are associated with lower levels of private health insurance losses. Taken in their entirety, this dissertation contributes to the literature by providing evidence on the influence of health insurance market operations and its interrelatedness with health outcomes, healthcare delivery, and the medical malpractice insurance market. The analysis presented here is also aids policymakers, physicians, insureds, and other health insurance market participants in evaluating the potential consequences of regulations and other factors which influence the private health insurance market. |
