title: The effect of Medicaid premiums on enrollment: a regression discontinuity approach.
abstract: This paper estimates the effect that premiums in Medicaid have on the length of enrollment of program beneficiaries. Whether and how low income-families will participate in the exchanges and in states' Medicaid programs depends crucially on the structure and amounts of the premiums they will face. I take advantage of discontinuities in the structure of Wisconsin's Medicaid program to identify the effects of premiums on enrollment for low-income families. I use a 3-year administrative panel of enrollment data to estimate these effects. I find an increase in the premium from 0 to 10 dollars per month results in 1.4 fewer months enrolled and reduces the probability of remaining enrolled for a full year by 12 percentage points, but other discrete changes in premium amounts do not affect enrollment or have a much smaller effect. I find no evidence of program enrollees intentionally decreasing labor supply in order to avoid the premiums.
authors.affiliation: Texas A&M University, United States. Electronic address: dague@tamu.edu.
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Dague
mesh_terms: D002648:Child; D002662:Child Health Services / Q000191:economics*; D006291:Health Policy; D006297:Health Services Accessibility; D006801:Humans; D007182:Income / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D019458:Insurance Coverage / Q000191:economics*; D007348:Insurance, Health / Q000191:economics; D008484:Medicaid / Q000191:economics*; D015233:Models, Statistical; D011203:Poverty / Q000191:economics; D013221:State Health Plans / Q000191:economics*; D013997:Time Factors; D014481:United States; D014922:Wisconsin
keywords: Administrative data; Medicaid; Premiums; Regression discontinuity; Wisconsin