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Moving for medicaid? Recent eligibility expansions did not induce migration from other states.
Moving for medicaid? Recent eligibility expansions did not induce migration from other states.
- Source :
-
Health affairs (Project Hope) [Health Aff (Millwood)] 2014 Jan; Vol. 33 (1), pp. 88-94. - Publication Year :
- 2014
-
Abstract
- Starting in 2014, many low-income adult residents of states that forgo the Affordable Care Act's expansion of Medicaid would be eligible for that program if they moved to a state that had chosen to expand its coverage. Some of these people may migrate to receive coverage, thereby increasing costs for states that have expanded the program. This is known as the "welfare magnet" hypothesis, a claim that geographic variation in social programs induces the migration of welfare recipients to places with more generous benefits or eligibility. To investigate whether such spillover effects are likely, we used data from the Current Population Survey to examine the migration patterns of low-income people before and after recent expansions of public insurance in Arizona, Maine, Massachusetts, and New York. Using difference-in-differences analysis of migration in expansion and control states, we found no evidence of significant migration effects. Our preferred estimate was precise enough to rule out net migration effects of larger than 1,600 people per year in an expansion state. These results suggest that migration will not be a common way for people to obtain Medicaid coverage under the current expansion and that interstate migration is not likely to be a significant source of costs for states choosing to expand their programs.
- Subjects :
- Adult
Eligibility Determination economics
Female
Financing, Government economics
Financing, Government trends
Forecasting
Humans
Insurance Coverage economics
Insurance Coverage trends
Male
Medicaid economics
Middle Aged
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act economics
Poverty economics
Social Welfare economics
Social Welfare trends
State Health Plans economics
State Health Plans trends
United States
Eligibility Determination trends
Medicaid trends
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act trends
Population Dynamics trends
Poverty trends
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 1544-5208
- Volume :
- 33
- Issue :
- 1
- Database :
- MEDLINE
- Journal :
- Health affairs (Project Hope)
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 24395939
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2013.0910