New health insurance insights
A new analysis of a randomized health insurance program in Oregon sheds light on the value the program has for enrollees and providers alike. The study, by MIT economist Amy Finkelstein and two co-authors, suggests that adults with low incomes value Medicaid at only about 20 cents to 50 cents per dollar of medical spending paid on their behalf. “The value of Medicaid for most low-income adults is much lower than the medical expenditures paid by the insurance,” says Finkelstein, the John and Jennie S. MacDonald Professor at MIT and a leading health care economist. That finding reinforces the results of another, separate study that Finkelstein and multiple co-authors conducted in Massachusetts. In that case, across 70 percent of people in the Massachusetts state health insurance program for low-income adults, their valuation of the program was equal to less than 50 percent of their expected insurance costs. While it might seem puzzling that recipients...