Covering the Uninsured in the United States
One of the major social policy issues facing the United States in the first decade of the twenty-first century is the large number of Americans lacking health insurance. This article surveys the major economic issues around covering the uninsured. I review the facts on insurance coverage and the nature of the uninsured; explore explanations for why the United States has such a large, and growing, uninsured population; and discuss why we should care if individuals are uninsured. I then examine policy options to address the problem of the uninsured, beginning with a discussion of the key issues and available evidence and then turning to estimates from a micro-simulation model of the impact of alternative interventions to increase insurance coverage.
- DOI
- 10.1257/jel.46.3.571
- Volume
- 46 (3)
- Pages
- 571-606
- Language
- en
- Export
- BibTeX
- Sources
- openalex crossref