The Impact of SCHIP on Insurance Coverage of Children

• Published in: Inquiry (Chicago) Vol. 42; no. 3; pp. 232 - 254
• Main Authors: Hudson, Julie L., Selden, Thomas M., Banthin, Jessica S.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA Excellus Health Plan, Inc 2005; SAGE Publications; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC; SAGE Publishing
• Subjects: Adult; Bias; Child; Child Health Services - economics; Child, Preschool; Children; Childrens health insurance programs; Control groups; Eligibility; Eligibility Determination; Entitlement programs; Estimating techniques; Female; Health insurance; Humans; Impact analysis; Indigent care; Infant; Instrumental variables estimation; Insurance coverage; Male; Medicaid; Medically Uninsured; Modeling; Models, Econometric; Poverty; Socioeconomic Factors; Standard error; State Health Plans - economics; State Health Plans - organization & administration; State Health Plans - trends; Studies; United States; United States; United States > US
• ISSN: 0046-9580; 1945-7243
• DOI: 10.5034/inquiryjrnl_42.3.232

In this paper we use the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey between 1996 and 2002 to investigate the impact of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) on insurance coverage for children. We explore a range of alternative estimation strategies, including instrumental variables and difference-in-trends models. We find that SCHIP had a significant impact in decreasing uninsurance and increasing public insurance for both children targeted by SCHIP and those eligible for Medicaid. With respect to changes in private coverage our results are less conclusive: some specifications resulted in no significant effect of SCHIP on private insurance coverage, while others showed significant decreases in private insurance. Associated estimates of SCHIP crowd-out had wide confidence intervals and were sensitive to estimation strategy.