New Study on Medicaid and Mortality
This NBER paper looks at the effects of Medicaid on mortality in children. Findings:
- Substantial decline in mortality in older black children.
- No effect on white children.
- No effect in states with the most Medicaid expansion.
I think this is illustrative of the economic divides present in America, particularly in the area of race.
I would have liked to see this study conducted along income lines instead of racial. That said, interesting finding.
I agree August, but the fact that they are on Medicaid is an indication of income.
Interesting paper…
It’s interesting to see the difference in mortality rates between black children and white children. Never thought there would be a difference between the two based on their ethnicity. I’m really curious to hear more about this.
The authors didn’t have actual data on actual Medicaid clients. Keep in mind that the results come from comparing groups that a simulation says should have been enrolled.
Then they looked at mortality by “state eligibility group.” This is based on a model of childhood public eligibility using info on state of residence, family structure and size, parent employment, and family income to calculate monthly eligibility. The data to estimate this came from the March CPS.
The comparison is for synthetic birth cohorts before and after September 30, 1983. The outcome variable was change in population mortality relative to a change in childrens’ age at which they became ineligible for Medicaid.
They constructed aggregate mortality death rates for monthly birth cohorts from Vital Statistics Birth and Death files for an “internal deaths” subset of all deaths.
I got sidetracked by Frakt’s entry regarding the JAMA paper showing multivitamins to help prevent cancer..