Two recent interesting articles on social insurance

In the article Estimates of Crowd-Out from a Public Health Insurance Expansion Using Administrative Data NBER researchers find that after expansion of eligibility for public coverage in the United States, approximately 20% of new enrollees had access to private health insurance at the time of enrollment and that only 8% dropped this coverage (with the remaining 12% having both private and public coverage). Authors conclude that the crowding out effect is low. In this other article, Disability, Pension Reform and Early Retirement in Germany, author find that despite increasing life expectancy and better health old age Labor Force Participation (or conversely early retirement) is decreasing (increasing). The authors argue that the generosity of the pension system is the main factor that explains the results. This last topic is treated in detail in the CISS Social Security Report 2012 that will be available in the next weeks.