Journal article
Medicaid expansion, tort reforms, and medical liability costs
The Journal of risk and insurance, Vol.89(3), pp.789-821
09/2022
DOI: 10.1111/jori.12376
Abstract
This paper examines the impacts of the Affordable Care Act (ACA)'s Medicaid expansion and tort reforms on the medical liability system. Medicaid expansion increased the demand for medical services, but in doing so it may also increase physicians' medical liability. By studying malpractice costs to insurers, medical practitioners, and hospitals in the United States in 2010–2018, we find insurers in Medicaid expansion states experienced higher medical liability costs than those in nonexpansion states. Medical practitioners paid higher premiums in expansion states but the premium increase was not enough to fully offset rising costs. In addition, we do not find that tort reforms mitigated ACA‐induced malpractice liability costs. We show this is because Medicaid expansion increased malpractice costs mainly by increasing claim frequency while tort reforms generally reduce claim severity. We also find little evidence that hospitals paid higher malpractice insurance premiums to insurers or self‐insurance programs, or incurred higher out‐of‐pocket medical liability losses after Medicaid expansion.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Medicaid expansion, tort reforms, and medical liability costs
- Creators
- Jingshu Luo - University of MississippiHua Chen - University of Hawaiʻi at MānoaMartin Grace - Georgia State University
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- The Journal of risk and insurance, Vol.89(3), pp.789-821
- DOI
- 10.1111/jori.12376
- ISSN
- 0022-4367
- eISSN
- 1539-6975
- Number of pages
- 33
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 09/2022
- Academic Unit
- Finance
- Record Identifier
- 9984701254702771
Metrics
1 Record Views