JEEA - Can Wealth Buy Health

<div><div>In this paper, we develop a life cycle model that features pecuniary and non-pecuniary investments in health in order to rationalize the socioeconomic gradients in health and life expectancy in the United States. Agents accumulate health capital, which affects labor productivity, utility, the distribution of medical spending shocks, and life expectancy. We find that unequal health insurance coverage plays a negligible role in generating the observed gaps in health and longevity. Universal health insurance increases preventive medical spending but not time spent in health promoting activities, as individuals are no longer worried about avoiding high curative medical expenditure shocks due to increased health insurance coverage. Our findings suggest that differences in lifetime income, preferences and health shocks are the main determinants of inequality in life expectancy.</div></div><br>

本文构建了一个纳入健康领域金钱与非金钱投入的生命周期模型，旨在解释美国健康与预期寿命层面的社会经济梯度差异。经济个体通过积累健康资本（health capital），该资本会对劳动生产率、效用水平、医疗支出冲击的分布以及预期寿命产生影响。研究表明，医疗保险覆盖率不均对观测到的健康与预期寿命差距的形成贡献甚微。全民医保可提升预防性医疗支出规模，但不会增加个体在健康促进活动上的投入时间——这是由于医保覆盖范围扩大后，个体无需再为规避高额治疗性医疗支出冲击而忧心忡忡。本研究结果显示，终身收入、个体偏好以及健康冲击的差异，是引发预期寿命不平等的核心决定因素。