The Impact of Macroeconomic Conditions on the Health Insurance Coverage of Americans

摘要

In March 2001, the longest economic expansion in U.S. history ended, and an economic recession began. This paper seeks to provide a better understanding of the historical relationship between macroeconomic variables and health insurance coverage. nnWe use data from two nationally representative samples: the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY). The longitudinal nature of our data allows us to remove individual-specific, time-invariant heterogeneity and to focus on changes in health insurance status in response to changes in macroeconomic variables.