Risk preferences and demand for insurance in Peru : a field experiment

This paper reports the results of behavioral economic experiments conducted in Peru to examine the relationship amongst risk preferences, loan take-up, and insurance purchase decisions. This area-based yield insurance can help reduce people's vulnerability to large scale covariate shocks, and c...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Galarza, Francisco, Carter, Michael R.
Formato: Libro
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/11354/367
http://biblioteca.clacso.edu.ar/gsdl/cgi-bin/library.cgi?a=d&c=pe/pe-014&d=11354367oai
Aporte de:
id I16-R122-11354367oai
record_format dspace
institution Consejo Latinoamericano de Ciencias Sociales
institution_str I-16
repository_str R-122
collection Red de Bibliotecas Virtuales de Ciencias Sociales (CLACSO)
language Inglés
topic Seguros
Crédito
spellingShingle Seguros
Crédito
Galarza, Francisco
Carter, Michael R.
Risk preferences and demand for insurance in Peru : a field experiment
topic_facet Seguros
Crédito
description This paper reports the results of behavioral economic experiments conducted in Peru to examine the relationship amongst risk preferences, loan take-up, and insurance purchase decisions. This area-based yield insurance can help reduce people's vulnerability to large scale covariate shocks, and can also lower the loan default probability under extreme negative covariate shocks. In a context of collateralized formal credit markets, we provide suggestive evidence that insurance may help reduce the fear of losing collateral that prevents potential borrowers from taking loans. Framing these experiments to recreate a real life situation, we started with a Baseline Game where subjects had to choose between a fallback production project and an uninsured loan. We then introduced a third project choice, loan with yield insurance (Insurance Game), which allows us to measure the effect of introducing insurance on the demand for loans. Overall, more than 50 percent of the subjects are willing to buy insurance in this insurance game. Further, controlling for the number of peers in the agricultural network, wealth, and choices made in the baseline game, we find that the project choice decision is predicted by a judgment bias known as hot-hand effect, and risk aversion. In the latter case, the shape of the relationship is quadratic, meaning that highly risk averse subjects will prefer switching to the risky, uninsured loan project, while those showing a low and moderate risk aversion will stick to the safer (fallback or insured loan) projects.
format Libro
Libro
author Galarza, Francisco
Carter, Michael R.
author_facet Galarza, Francisco
Carter, Michael R.
author_sort Galarza, Francisco
title Risk preferences and demand for insurance in Peru : a field experiment
title_short Risk preferences and demand for insurance in Peru : a field experiment
title_full Risk preferences and demand for insurance in Peru : a field experiment
title_fullStr Risk preferences and demand for insurance in Peru : a field experiment
title_full_unstemmed Risk preferences and demand for insurance in Peru : a field experiment
title_sort risk preferences and demand for insurance in peru : a field experiment
publishDate 2014
url http://hdl.handle.net/11354/367
http://biblioteca.clacso.edu.ar/gsdl/cgi-bin/library.cgi?a=d&c=pe/pe-014&d=11354367oai
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