IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jfamec/v37y2016i2d10.1007_s10834-016-9491-6.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Burden of Medical Debt Faced by Households with Dependent Children in the United States: Implications for the Affordable Care Act of 2010

Author

Listed:
  • Patrick Richard

    (Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences)

Abstract

This paper examines the relationship between the number of dependent children and medical debt outcomes. Results show that the presence of dependent children in the household increased the probability of having any medical debt by 8 % for “high” financial burden households, 4 % for households at the 50th percentile of the income distribution and 3 % for privately insured households. The amount of medical debt by households at the 75th percentile of the income distribution was also increased. These findings show that the number of dependent children in the household was associated with medical debt for households in the middle of the income distribution. These results may be explained by the fact that those households at the lower tail of the income distribution are more likely to have public coverage, which tends to have lower cost sharing compared to those with private insurance.

Suggested Citation

  • Patrick Richard, 2016. "The Burden of Medical Debt Faced by Households with Dependent Children in the United States: Implications for the Affordable Care Act of 2010," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 212-225, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jfamec:v:37:y:2016:i:2:d:10.1007_s10834-016-9491-6
    DOI: 10.1007/s10834-016-9491-6
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10834-016-9491-6
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10834-016-9491-6?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David M. Cutler & Adriana Lleras-Muney & Tom Vogl, 2008. "Socioeconomic Status and Health: Dimensions and Mechanisms," NBER Working Papers 14333, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Paul Gertler & David I. Levine & Enrico Moretti, 2009. "Do microfinance programs help families insure consumption against illness?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(3), pages 257-273, March.
    3. Scott Adams & Benjamin Artz, 2015. "Health Insurance, Familial Responsibilities and Job Satisfaction," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 36(1), pages 143-153, March.
    4. Patryk Babiarz & Richard Widdows & Tansel Yilmazer, 2013. "Borrowing To Cope With Adverse Health Events: Liquidity Constraints, Insurance Coverage, And Unsecured Debt," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(10), pages 1177-1198, October.
    5. Gary S. Becker, 1981. "A Treatise on the Family," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number beck81-1.
    6. Mariacristina De Nardi & Eric French & John B. Jones, 2010. "Why Do the Elderly Save? The Role of Medical Expenses," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 118(1), pages 39-75, February.
    7. Anna Aizer, 2003. "Low Take-Up in Medicaid: Does Outreach Matter and for Whom?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(2), pages 238-241, May.
    8. Janet Currie & Jonathan Gruber, 1996. "Health Insurance Eligibility, Utilization of Medical Care, and Child Health," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 111(2), pages 431-466.
    9. Gross, Tal & Notowidigdo, Matthew J., 2011. "Health insurance and the consumer bankruptcy decision: Evidence from expansions of Medicaid," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(7-8), pages 767-778, August.
    10. Anna Aizer, 2007. "Public Health Insurance, Program Take-Up, and Child Health," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(3), pages 400-415, August.
    11. repec:pri:cheawb:case_paxson_economic_status_paper is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Anne Case & Darren Lubotsky & Christina Paxson, 2002. "Economic Status and Health in Childhood: The Origins of the Gradient," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1308-1334, December.
    13. Elizabeth Dolan & Manouchehr Mokhtari, 2013. "The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA): Pros and Cons," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 34(1), pages 1-2, March.
    14. Cutler, David M. & Zeckhauser, Richard J., 2000. "The anatomy of health insurance," Handbook of Health Economics, in: A. J. Culyer & J. P. Newhouse (ed.), Handbook of Health Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 11, pages 563-643, Elsevier.
    15. Kaestner, R. & Joyce, T. & Racine, A., 2001. "Medicaid eligibility and the incidence of ambulatory care sensitive hospitalizations for children," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 305-313, January.
    16. Paul Gertler & Jonathan Gruber, 2002. "Insuring Consumption Against Illness," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(1), pages 51-70, March.
    17. Dylan Roby & Greg Watson & Ken Jacobs & Dave Graham-Squire & Christina Kinane & Daphna Gans & Jack Needleman & Gerald Kominski, 2013. "Modeling the Impact of the Affordable Care Act and the Individual Mandate on Californians," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 34(1), pages 16-28, March.
    18. Amy Finkelstein & Sarah Taubman & Bill Wright & Mira Bernstein & Jonathan Gruber & Joseph P. Newhouse & Heidi Allen & Katherine Baicker, 2012. "The Oregon Health Insurance Experiment: Evidence from the First Year," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(3), pages 1057-1106.
    19. repec:pri:cheawb:case_paxson_economic_status_paper.pdf is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Bhashkar Mazumder & Sarah Miller, 2014. "The Effects of the Massachusetts Health Reform on Financial Distress," Working Paper Series WP-2014-1, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    21. Islam, Asadul & Maitra, Pushkar, 2012. "Health shocks and consumption smoothing in rural households: Does microcredit have a role to play?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(2), pages 232-243.
    22. David A. Freedman & Richard A. Berk, 2008. "Weighting Regressions by Propensity Scores," Evaluation Review, , vol. 32(4), pages 392-409, August.
    23. Dafny, Leemore & Gruber, Jonathan, 2005. "Public insurance and child hospitalizations: access and efficiency effects," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 109-129, January.
    24. Kvist, Anette Primdal & Nielsen, Helena Skyt & Simonsen, Marianne, 2013. "The importance of children's ADHD for parents' relationship stability and labor supply," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 30-38.
    25. Victor R. Fuchs, 1982. "Time Preference and Health: An Exploratory Study," NBER Chapters, in: Economic Aspects of Health, pages 93-120, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    26. Jonathan Gruber & Helen Levy, 2009. "The Evolution of Medical Spending Risk," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(4), pages 25-48, Fall.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Patrick Richard & Nilam Patel & Yuan-Chiao Lu & Regine Walker & Mustafa Younis, 2021. "The Financial Burden of Cancer on Families in the United States," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(7), pages 1-14, April.
    2. Yuan-Chiao Lu & Regine Walker & Patrick Richard & Mustafa Younis, 2019. "Inequalities in Poverty and Income between Single Mothers and Fathers," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(1), pages 1-15, December.
    3. Irina B. Grafova & Alan C. Monheit & Rizie Kumar, 2020. "How Do Economic Shocks Affect Family Health Care Spending Burdens?," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 41(3), pages 442-457, September.
    4. Das, Upasak & Biswas, Shreya, 2023. "Fuelling down after a lockdown: Effects of the first COVID wave on clean fuel usage in India," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    5. Min Cui & Jizhou Zhang & Xianli Xia, 2022. "The Relationship between Child Rearing Burden and Farmers’ Adoption of Climate Adaptive Technology: Taking Water-Saving Irrigation Technology as an Example," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 12(6), pages 1-22, June.
    6. Manouchehr Mokhtari, 2016. "Affordable Health Care," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 135-139, June.
    7. Anoshua Chaudhuri, 2021. "Health Research in JFEI Over a Decade: 2009–2019," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 42(1), pages 142-153, July.
    8. Jiajing Li & Chen Jiao & Stephen Nicholas & Jian Wang & Gong Chen & Jinghua Chang, 2020. "Impact of Medical Debt on the Financial Welfare of Middle- and Low-Income Families across China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(12), pages 1-13, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Owen (O.A.) O'Donnell, 2019. "Financial Protection Against Medical Expense," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 19-010/V, Tinbergen Institute.
    2. Marianne P. Bitler & Madeline Zavodny, 2014. "Medicaid: A Review of the Literature," NBER Working Papers 20169, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Thomas Buchmueller & John C. Ham & Lara D. Shore-Sheppard, 2015. "The Medicaid Program," NBER Chapters, in: Economics of Means-Tested Transfer Programs in the United States, Volume 1, pages 21-136, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. repec:mrr:papers:wp341 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Almond, Douglas & Currie, Janet, 2011. "Human Capital Development before Age Five," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 15, pages 1315-1486, Elsevier.
    6. Patrick Richard & Regine Walker & Pierre Alexandre, 2018. "The burden of out of pocket costs and medical debt faced by households with chronic health conditions in the United States," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(6), pages 1-13, June.
    7. Raj Chetty & Amy Finkelstein, 2012. "Social Insurance: Connecting Theory to Data," NBER Working Papers 18433, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Laura R. Wherry & Bruce D. Meyer, 2016. "Saving Teens: Using a Policy Discontinuity to Estimate the Effects of Medicaid Eligibility," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 51(3), pages 556-588.
    9. Thompson, Owen, 2017. "The long-term health impacts of Medicaid and CHIP," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 26-40.
    10. Patryk Babiarz & Tansel Yilmazer, 2017. "The impact of adverse health events on consumption: Understanding the mediating effect of income transfers, wealth, and health insurance," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(12), pages 1743-1758, December.
    11. Bronchetti, Erin Todd, 2014. "Public insurance expansions and the health of immigrant and native children," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 205-219.
    12. Joelle Abramowitz & Brett O'Hara & Darcy Steeg Morris, 2017. "Risking Life and Limb: Estimating a Measure of Medical Care Economic Risk and Considering its Implications," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(4), pages 469-485, April.
    13. Charles Courtemanche & James Marton & Benjamin Ukert & Aaron Yelowitz & Daniela Zapata, 2018. "Early Effects of the Affordable Care Act on Health Care Access, Risky Health Behaviors, and Self‐Assessed Health," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 84(3), pages 660-691, January.
    14. Michael F. Lovenheim & Randall Reback & Leigh Wedenoja, 2016. "How Does Access to Health Care Affect Teen Fertility and High School Dropout Rates? Evidence from School-based Health Centers," NBER Working Papers 22030, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Bernal, Noelia & Carpio, Miguel A. & Klein, Tobias J., 2017. "The effects of access to health insurance: Evidence from a regression discontinuity design in Peru," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 154(C), pages 122-136.
    16. Toshiaki Iizuka & Hitoshi Shigeoka, 2018. "Free for Children? Patient Cost-sharing and Healthcare Utilization," NBER Working Papers 25306, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Liu, Kai, 2016. "Insuring against health shocks: Health insurance and household choices," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 16-32.
    18. Andrey Aistov & Ekaterina Aleksandrova & Christopher J. Gerry, 2021. "Voluntary private health insurance, health-related behaviours and health outcomes: evidence from Russia," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 22(2), pages 281-309, March.
    19. Marcus Dillender, 2017. "English Skills and the Health Insurance Coverage of Immigrants," American Journal of Health Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 3(3), pages 312-345, Summer.
    20. Qureshi, Javaeria A. & Gangopadhyaya, Anuj, 2021. "Childhood Medicaid Eligibility and Human Capital," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    21. Aurélien Baillon & Aleli Kraft & Owen O’Donnell & Kim Wilgenburg, 2022. "A behavioral decomposition of willingness to pay for health insurance," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 64(1), pages 43-87, February.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:jfamec:v:37:y:2016:i:2:d:10.1007_s10834-016-9491-6. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.