Author |
Conference Paper |
Summary |
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Bhattacharya, Jay
Schoenbaum, Michael |
The Value of the Medicare Benefit for Social Security Disability Insurance Recipients and Applicants (PDF) |
While the value of cash assistance provided by Social Security's Disability Insurance (DI) benefit has been much studied by economists, the influence of the Medicare coverage that comes with DI has not. Jay Bhattacharya and Michael Schoenbaum provide a first look at this relationship in their paper. They find that the value of Medicare to DI recipients varies by age and disabling condition. DI recipients with mental retardation and mental illness have the highest expected service use while, at the low end, those who obtain DI because of arthritis can expect to use services that cost between four tenths and one fifth as much. |
Project Summary |
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Chernew, Michael
Cutler, David
Keenan, Patricia |
Rising Health Care Costs and the Decline in Insurance Coverage (PDF) |
Michael Chernew, David Cutler, and Patricia Keenan tackle the question of how cost relates to coverage in their paper. Looking at the pattern across the U.S. of rising health care costs, they find coverage declined more rapidly in areas that experienced more rapid cost growth over the 1990's. They consistently find that for each one percent that health insurance premiums increased faster than overall inflation, health insurance declines by more than one percent. |
Project Summary |
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Gruber, Jonathan
McKnight, Robin |
Why Did Employee Health Insurance Contributions Rise? (PDF) |
The share of employees covered by employer-provided health insurance who paid no premium for their coverage fell from 44 percent in 1982 to 28 percent in 1998. Jonathan Gruber and Robin McKnight explore the reasons for thus phenomenon in their paper. The factors they implicate include declining tax rates, rising opportunities to obtain coverage other than from one's own employer (through spouses or Medicaid), and the state of the overall economy. Together these factors account for a quarter of the increased share of workers who pay some or all of their premium. |
Project Summary |
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| Levy, Helen |
The Economic Consequences of Being Uninsured (PDF) |
Helen Levy's paper looks at what happens to older persons with and without health insurance who experience a serious new health condition including cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. She compares the impact on wealth for the onset of a series of health conditions. Insured older persons are more likely to include stopping work as one of their responses to ill health while the uninsured who work are more likely to work more. |
Project Summary |
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Pollack, Harold
Davis, Matthew
Danziger, Sheldon |
Health Insurance Coverage and Access to Care Among Former TANF Recipients (PDF) |
Children's health insurance and health service use in families that leave welfare depends on what happens to their parents, according to Harold Pollack, Matthew Davis, and Sheldon Danziger. While 85 percent of children in welfare leaving families had health insurance, among those who did not, 83 percent lived in households headed by an uninsured adult. |
Project Summary |
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Shapiro, Matthew
Kimball, Miles |
Health Insurance and Labor Supply: Evidence from Hypothetical Shocks (PDF) |
The Matthew Shapiro and Miles Kimball paper represents the first effort to use responses to survey questions to estimate the effect of health insurance on the decision to keep on working or quit one's job. In the Shapiro-Kimball survey, respondents were asked about their behavior if they won a lottery with winnings that would completely replace their current earnings. If assured health insurance, 32 percent would quit their jobs. However, without assurance of continued health insurance, only 21 percent would quit their jobs. The magnitude of the health insurance effect suggests that workers fear insurance would be hard to get or cost a great deal outside of employer-provided coverage. |
Project Summary |
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Weir, David
Willis, Robert |
Widowhood, Divorce, and Loss of Health Insurance Among Near-Elderly Women: Evidence from the Health and Retirement Study (PDF) |
Older women who become widowed are more likely to lose health insurance than those who stay married or who are already widowed. David Weir and Robert J. Willis report that older widows are more likely to be without health insurance than women in any other marital status (married, never married, divorced, or separated.) However, women who become widowed were more likely to have been without health insurance before being widowed than were other married women. Thus it is not clear whether the higher rate of uninsurance among widows reflects the effect of widowhood or the characteristics of those who become widowed. |
Project Summary |
