这个专栏推出行为经济学和制度以及其它社会问题的关系的论文讨论，行为经济学已经开始渗透到制度经济学、社会经济学、健康经济学等。本次先贴出行为经济学和健康经济学关系的文章，请张三李四等版主点评

BEHAVIORAL ECONOMICS AND HEALTH ECONOMICS Richard G. Frank Working Paper 10881 http://www.nber.org/papers/w10881

The health sector is filled with institutions and decision-making circumstances that create friction in markets and cognitive errors by decision makers. This paper examines the potential contributions to health economics of the ideas of behavioral economics. The discussion presented here focuses on the economics of doctor-patient interactions and some aspects of quality of care. It also touches on issues related to insurance and the demand for health care. The paper argues that long standing research impasses may be aided by applying concepts from behavioral economics.

[此贴子已经被作者于2004-11-14 16:29:47编辑过]

Medical Malpractice and the Insurance Underwriting Cycle Tom Baker

闲人兄提出了一个很好的题目，但惭愧得很，我确实没有能力来“点评”。一方面，我对行为主义的经济学和健康经济学都所知无多，票友毕竟是票友，呵呵。另一方面，说出来不怕大家笑话，我至今不知道怎么打开，怎么解压缩这种文件。就算打开了，只怕也未必看得懂，英语差不多都还给老师了。

但我决定还是说上几句，算是一篇命题作文吧。

提一个问题：假设你得了一种病，有万分之一的可能性会突然死亡。现在有一种药吃了以后可以把死亡的可能性降到零，那么你愿意花多少钱来买这种药呢？请把你愿意出的最高价钱写下来： 元

假定你身体很健康，如果说医药公司想找一些人来测试他们新研制的一种药品，这种药服用后会使你有万分之一的几率突然死亡。那么医药公司起码要付多少钱你才愿意服用这种药呢？你把你的答案写下来： 元

按照新古典的说法，据说在风险偏好给定的情况下，这两个价格应该是一样的，但是大量的行为试验已经证明，对绝大多数人来说，后者的要价更高。

再举一个例子，前两天我诊断了一个病人，是急性淋巴细胞性白血病，家属悲痛万分。我告诉他们，可以治。花费20万元左右，有20%左右的机会可以治愈。家属商量的结果，是放弃治疗。我又告诉他们，由于骨髓涂片检查本身的局限，可能有1%左右的误判可能。进一步检查可以去上海做活检和基因分析。他们欢天喜地，马上全家赶去上海。

一家去上海，交通食宿费用，住院检查费用加起来不会少于10000元，很可能更多。病人的这两个决策从“理性”的角度来看是相互矛盾。这里存在着对“利好”消息的过度反应。

“健康经济学”中突出的两个问题是：信息和风险，事实上，卫生经济学真正建立的标志是Arrow在1963年发表的经典论文“不确定性与卫生保健的福利经济学”（Arrow，1963）。对信息的反应问题，对风险的处理问题，对偏好是否“稳定”的看法，这些区别足以导致健康经济学的完全重构。所以，行为主义的发展对健康经济学的发展来说，是至关重要的。

张三李四兄老是谦虚，这个点评整个就是非常恰当的行为经济学解释嘛，非常感谢。

这个文件是一个图，表达了组织经济学的各种脉络的关系，非常简练。有助于学习行为微观经济学，特别是行为经济学对企业理论的贡献

那咱们要看看!

Persuasion in Politics Kevin M. Murphy and Andrei Shleifer University of Chicago and Harvard University January 8, 2004

We present a model of the creation of social networks, such as political parties, trade unions, religious coalitions, or political action committees, through discussion and mutual persuasion among their members. The key idea is that people are influenced by those inside their network, but not by those outside. Once created, networks can be “rented out” to politicians who seek votes and support for their initiatives and ideas, which may have little to do with network members’ core beliefs. In this framework, political competition does not lead to convergence of party platforms to the views of the median voter. Rather, parties separate their messages and try to isolate their members to prevent personal influence from those in the opposition.

[此贴子已经被作者于2004-11-19 8:07:34编辑过]

The Market for News
Sendhil Mullainathan
MIT and NBER
Andrei Shleifer
Harvard University and NBER 
December 30, 2003
Abstract
We investigate the market for news under two assumptions: that readers hold beliefs that
they like to see confirmed, and that newspapers can slant stories toward these beliefs. We
show that, on the topics where readers share common beliefs, one should not expect accuracy
even from competitive media: competition results in lower prices, but common slanting toward
reader biases. However, on topics where reader beliefs diverge (such as politically divisive issues),
newspapers segment the market and slant toward the biases of their own audiences, yet in the
aggregate a conscientious reader could get an unbiased perspective. Generally speaking, reader
heterogeneity is more important for accuracy in media than competition per se.

Is Addiction \Rational"? Theory and Evidence1 Jonathan Gruber, MIT and NBER Botond K}oszegi, MIT January 31, 2001

A standard model of addictive processes is Becker and Murphy's "rational addiction" model, which has the key empirical prediction that the current consumption of addictive goods should re-spond to future prices, and the key normative prediction that the optimal government regulation of addictive goods should depend only on their interpersonal externalities. While a variety of previous studies have supported this empirical contention, we demonstrate that these results are very fragile. We propose a new empirical test for the case of cigarettes, using state excise tax increases that have been legislatively enacted but are not yet eective, and monthly data on consumption. We nd strong evidence that consumption drops when there are announced future tax increases, providing more robust support for the key empirical prediction of the Becker and Murphy model. But we also propose a new formulation of this model that makes only one change, albeit a major one: the incorporation of time inconsistent preferences which are likely provide a much better platform for understanding the smoking decision. We nd that with these preferences the model continues to yield the predictions for forward-looking behavior that have been tested by others and by ourselves. But it has strikingly dierent normative implications, as with these preferences optimal government policy should depend as well on the "internalities" imposed by smokers on themselves. We estimate that the optimal tax per pack of cigarettes should at least one dollar higher under our formulation than in the rational addiction case.

Health Anxiety and Patient Behavior
Botond K}oszegi, UC Berkeley
August 20, 2002
Abstract
Economic models of patient decisionmaking emphasize the costs of getting medical
attention and the improved physical health that results from it. This paper builds a
model of patient decisionmaking when fears or anxiety about the future{captured as
beliefs about next period's state of health{enter the patient's utility function. Anxiety
can lead people to avoid doctor's visits or other easily available information about their
health. However, this avoidance cannot take any form: patients will never avoid the
doctor with small problems, and under regularity conditions they will never go to a
bad doctor to limit the information received. In general, information with a potential
\bad surprise" is least preferred by agents.

Anxiety and the Doctor-Patient Relationship: Theory and Some
Evidence
Botond K}oszegi, UC Berkeley
September 2003
Abstract
This paper identies an array of complications in doctor-patient communication that arise
when the patient suers from anxiety. I assume that the patient derives utility from health
outcomes as well as the anticipation of the exact same outcomes, and that the doctor wishes
to maximize the patient's utility. The doctor privately (and probabilistically) observes a diagnosis,
which aects the optimal treatment. She then sends a message to the patient, who
chooses a treatment. If the doctor cannot certiably communicate the diagnosis, communication
is endogenously limited to a treatment recommendation, which the doctor distorts toward
the treatment that is optimal when the patient is relatively healthy. Paradoxically, more emotional patients get worse recommendations, even though basing their treatment choice on better recommendations would make them less anxious. If the doctor can certiably communicate the diagnosis, she does so for good news, but unless she needs to \shock" the patient into behaving correctly, she pretends not to know what is going on when the news is bad. If the patient visits two doctors in a row, the second doctor reveals more information than the rst one, and the rst one gives more information to patients who do not want to know what will happen to them than to those who do want to know. Results from an original survey of practicing physicians conrm that doctors care about patients' emotions, and alter their recommendations and other communication in response to them.

11楼说的不是前景理论（prospect theory）吗？卡内曼和特维斯基的著名解释，似乎是由于人们对于损失比对于收益更为风险厌恶？但是，如果通过对效用函数的不同部分（收益、损失）加权，是否依然可以用经典的动态规划来求解？

怎么用动态规划来求解?请nie兄指教.

如果把效用函数分成两部分，分别对收益和损失赋予不同的权重，并且加入时间，应用动态规划（给定起点或路径、边界条件）求解阿；不加入时间就是一般的线性规划阿。有什么不妥吗？

这实际上是非常困难的，俺们最近弄了一个，没解出来

我要多多努力才是

高见。

高手啊。

在波动性方面，行为经济学和制度经济学有什么不同的解释？

行为经济学说是人的保守性和特征启发性引起了人的反映不足和过度反映从而引起了市场的波动。

而制度经济学从人的知识性角度出发，说人的不同知识和对信息的不同反映，从而集合的形成秩序，但该种秩序是包含了不同接受程度的信息分析的。

我想听一下相关的论述。

谢谢！！

制度经济学是否能解释市场波动？这一点俺不太了解。如果是信息的原因导致波动，那是新古典的解释，不是制度经济学的解释

有人从交易费用的角度研究证券市场波动，可以用一个指标计量交易费用。好像《管理世界》2004（12）上有一篇类似文章，没有细看。

从交易费用角度研究证券市场是微观结构理论的一个起点，比如最早德姆塞茨就是如此。但这种研究和NIE的研究还是相差甚远，比如对交易费用的界定就很大不同

偶感觉，NIE研究的相对长期的东西，制度的形成和变迁嘛，像市场波动这种ΔT=0的不在其研究范围内。