"Risk, Information and Insurance": Essays in the Memory of Karl H. Borch

Orio Giarini The "Geneva Association" (International Association for the Study of Risk and Insurance Economics) was founded in 1973. The main goal was to stimulate and organize objective research in the field of risk, uncertainty, and insurance, in a world in which such issues were clearly becoming of greater and greater relevance for all economic actors. This was a pioneer­ ing effort, especially as economic theory and the teaching of economics were still anchored to the key notion of general equilibrium under an assumption of certainty. Thus, we had to start our work almost from scratch. One of the first initiatives was to bring together in Geneva, in June of 1973, all the academics in Europe already involved in risk and insurance economics. We found eight from five different countries who never had met before. This seminar chaired by Raymond Barre, the first president of The Geneva Association, was the first of an annual series that became known as the seminar of "The European Group of Risk and Insurance Economists." Since then more than 100 economists from most European countries as well as participants from two other continents and in particular from the United States have taken part in this seminar. Front Matter....Pages i-xiii Introduction....Pages 1-14 Borch’s Theorem: A Historical Survey of Applications....Pages 15-37 Front Matter....Pages 39-39 The Role of Securities and Labor Contracts in the Optimal Allocation of Risk-Bearing....Pages 41-65 Proportional Risk Aversion and Saving Decisions under Uncertainty....Pages 67-87 Front Matter....Pages 89-89 The Welfare Economics of Moral Hazard....Pages 91-121 Problems of Equilibria in Insurance Markets with Asymmetric Information....Pages 123-141 Moral Hazard and Insurance Market Structure....Pages 143-163 The Effects of Organizational Form on Capital Structure: The Case of Stock and Mutual Property-Liability Insurance Firms....Pages 165-182 Front Matter....Pages 183-183 Strategic Growth and Profit Policy of Insurance Companies....Pages 185-198 (De) Regulation of Insurance Markets....Pages 199-220 Price Regulation and Segmented Insurance Markets....Pages 221-229 The Microstructure of the London Insurance Market....Pages 231-256 Do Shares in other Insurance Companies Reduce the Solvency Margin of an Insurer?....Pages 257-267 Back Matter....Pages 269-274 Edited By Henri Loubergé ; Sponsored By The Geneva Association. Includes Bibliographical References.