Health insurance States

George Kaplan has shown that US states with greater inequality have higher rates of violence, more disability, more people without health insurance, less investment in education and literacy, and poorer educational outcomes, all of which he calls structural characteristics. Moreover, the socioenvironmental characters of population areas are importantly related to the mortality rates, independent of the characters of individuals. In addition, personal and socioeconomic risk factors cluster together in areas of low income and high mortality. In a thorough local study of Alameda County, California, Kaplan examined parts of the pathways linking social class and mortality. His basic claim is that health inequality is correlated to social instability, which is in turn correlated to the lack of investment in structural characteristics, such as education, proximity of healthful food outlets, pharmacies, accessibility of transportation, etc. 

Some people may choose not to use their insurance to pay for testing because the results of a genetic test can affect a person s health insurance coverage. Instead, they may opt to pay out-of-pocket for the test. People considering genetic testing may want to find out more about their state s privacy protection laws before they ask their insurance company to cover the costs. 

Availability of vouchers may crowd out private health insurance coverage. If vouchers make being uninsured better than it would otherwise be, fewer persons may be expected to purchase insurance. But states have implemented policies to deter crowd-out for other government health insurance programs. ... 

Lo Sasso, A. T., and T. C. BuchmueUer. 2004. The Effect of the State Children s Health Insurance Program on Health Insurance Coverage. Journal of Health Economics 23(5) 1059-1082. 

Medicaid A federal and state partnership to provide health insurance to the needy (or those with low income and assets) that has become the only source of prescription drugs for many. 

The cost of health care became a hot public issue in the United States in the early 1990s. It swept an unknown, onetime university president named Harris Wofford into the Senate from Pennsylvania in 1991 and helped elect Bill Clinton president in 1992. Health insurance premiums were shooting up by double digits every year, some 37 million Americans didn t even have insurance, and if things kept on as they were, experts predicted, medical care would devour more than one-fourth of the gross national product by 2030. It was the rare case of an issue that seemed to unite both consumers, who couldn t afford to pay for health care, and business, which ended up being billed extra to pick up the unpaid charges of the uninsured. Some sort of national health care plan was a sure bet. 

It s no secret why AIDS gets attention and the neglected diseases don t It s the only one that also affects a large number of people in the United States with the money and health insurance to pay for prescriptions and the political clout to influence government and pharmaceutical officials. Now, is Big Pharma supposed to be working on those other diseases when it is unlikely to make any money ... 

State Children s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).309... 

President John F. Kermedy made Medicare a major election issue in 1960, but it was not unhl Lyndon Johnson achieved a landslide victory, accompanied by Democrahc control of Congress, thaf another defining step was taken in the history of health insurance coverage. In 1965, Congress amended the Social Security Act to implement Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid to help states pay for health services for their very low-income parents and children. 

Health insurance is financed by purchasers. In the U.S., purchasers are employers, government (federal, state, and local), and individuals. Figure 18.1 is a chart displaying the sources of health insurance for people in the U.S. in 2001. 

No federal or state laws require that private employers provide health insurance to their employees. Employers offer health insurance in order to attract and retain employees, and union contracts typically require that... 

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