The dual role of insurance in input use: Mitigating risk versus curtailing incentives
研究了保险如何既鼓励使用高风险投入品，又因难以监督而削弱努力激励，从而减少互补性投入品的使用。基于ICRISAT面板数据估计模型，发现无风险分担时中位化肥使用量几乎是完全保险下的三倍，而化肥价格减半补贴可使农民福利提高37%。
Insurance can encourage the use of risk-increasing inputs, but it can also decrease people’s incentives to exert effort when the latter is difficult to monitor. This effort reduction can be associated with a decrease in the use of effort-complementary inputs. I study a model of risk-sharing that allows for both effects of insurance on input use and use the latest ICRISAT panel to structurally estimate it. Median fertilizer use is almost three times higher under no sharing than under full insurance for reasonable levels of risk aversion. A subsidy that halves fertilizer prices increases farmers’ welfare by 37% in consumption-equivalent terms.