To draw on the experiences under assachusetts's 2006 reform, the template for the ffordable are ct (), to provide insights into the potential impacts of the edicaid expansion for low‐income childless adults in other states.
Data Sources/Study Setting
The study takes advantage of the natural experiment in assachusetts and combined data from two surveys—the assachusetts ealth eform urvey () and the ational ealth nterview urvey ()—to estimate the impacts of reform on low‐income adults.
Difference‐in‐differences models of the impacts of health reform, using propensity‐score reweighting to improve the match between assachusetts and the comparison states.
Data Collection/Extraction Methods
Data for low‐income adults are obtained by combining data from the and the , where the provides a relatively large assachusetts sample and the provides data for samples in other states to support the difference‐in‐differences model. Supplemental data on county economic and health care market characteristics are obtained from the rea ealth esource ile.
There are strong increases in coverage and access to health care for low‐income adults under health reform in assachusetts, with the greatest gains observed for childless adults, who were not eligible for public coverage prior to reform.
In the states that implement the edicaid provisions of the , we would expect to see large increases in coverage rates and commensurate gains in access to care for low‐income childless adults. Linking state and federal surveys offers a strategy for leveraging the value of state‐specific survey data for stronger policy evaluations.
