NBER Publications by George Zanjani

Catastrophe bonds feature full collateralization of the underlying risk transfer, and thus abandon the insurance principle of economizing on collateral through diversification. We examine the theoretical foundations beneath this paradox, finding that fully collateralized instruments have important uses in a risk transfer market when insurers cannot contract completely over the division of assets in the event of insolvency, and, more generally, cannot write contracts with a full menu of state-contingent payments. In this environment, insureds have different levels of exposure to an insurer's default. When contracting constraints limit the insurer's ability to smooth out such differences, catastrophe bonds can be used to deliver coverage to those most exposed to default. We demonstrate how...

This paper investigates the rationale for government intervention in the market for terrorism insurance, focusing on the externalities associated with self-protection. Self-protection by one target encourages terrorists to substitute towards less fortified targets. Investments in self- protection thus have negative external effects in the presence of rational terrorists. Government subsidies for terror insurance can discourage self-protection and limit the inefficiencies associated with these and other types of negative externalities. They may also serve as a complement to a policy of publicly provided protection.

Many forms of insurance are produced by groups themselves rather than purchased in the market. For example, coverage for workers compensation provided by employers is often produced by the employer, in the sense that the employer bears some or all of the financial risk associated with the insurance. This paper generalizes the theory of insurance to analyze what factors determine whether groups produce insurance internally by self-insuring or consume it by purchasing coverage in the market. The" theory makes cross-sectional predictions on which firms will choose to produce insurance, as well as how prices and loss experience will vary with the production decision; the theory also predicts which lines of insurance are likely to be associated with internal production and those in which cove...