AN NBER PUBLICATION
ISSUE: No. 2, June 2004
The Bulletin on Aging & Health
Over 43 million Americans, or some 17% of the non-elderly population, lacked health insurance in 2002. Previous research has established that the uninsured have worse health outcomes, but the effect of insurance on health outcomes is more difficult to ascertain. For example, if insured and uninsured persons differ systematically in various behaviors that affect health, such as diet, smoking, and exercise, then observed differences in health outcomes might not...
Article
The recent corporate scandals at several large, publicly traded firms such as Enron and WorldCom were particularly devastating for many employees of these firms, who had invested their retirement assets heavily in company stock. Such behavior is a clear violation of diversification principles - one study finds that the additional risk associated with investing in company stock has an average cost equivalent to 42% of the stock's value. Yet despite the risks, such behavior is...
Article
The passage of the landmark Clean Air Act in 1970 launched an era of tightening standards for air pollutants. This process continues today and can be quite contentious. For example, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued new standards for ozone and particulate matter in 1997, but they were held up by legal challenges until a Supreme Court decision in 2001. Just last month, the EPA moved towards enforcing the new standards by announcing the names of 500 counties --...