Including Health Insurance in Poverty Measurement: The Impact of Massachusetts Health Reform on Poverty / Sanders Korenman, Dahlia K. Remler.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Korenman, Sanders.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Remler, Dahlia K.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w21990.

NBER working paper series no. w21990

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

Including Health Insurance in Poverty Measurement

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2016.

Summary:

We develop and implement what we believe is the first conceptually valid health-inclusive poverty measure (HIPM)--a measure that includes health care or insurance in the poverty needs threshold and health insurance benefits in family resources--and we discuss its limitations. Building on the Census Bureau's Supplemental Poverty Measure, we construct a pilot HIPM for the under-65 population under ACA-like health reform in Massachusetts. This pilot is intended to demonstrate the practicality, face validity and value of a HIPM. Results suggest that public health insurance benefits and premium subsidies accounted for a substantial, one-third reduction in the poverty rate. Among low-income families who purchased individual insurance, premium subsidies reduced poverty by 9.4 percentage points.

Notes:

Print version record

February 2016.