Related BLS programs | Related articles
Craig A. Olson
P roposals to control health care costs and provide broader access to health care services dominate the domestic policy agenda. Most workers who are covered by health insurance receive these benefits through their employer.
An analysis of Current Population Survey data show a decline in the likelihood that married men in the prime working ages-between 25 and 55-would have health care benefits provided by the employer. The decline occurred among all age and education groups, but was more pronounced among younger, less educated men. These trends substantially widen the gap in coverage between age and education groups.
This article examines the distribution of employer-provided health benefits, using data from the March Current Population Surveys (CPS) conducted by the Bureau of Census over the 1980-93 period.1 The March CPS survey includes questions on family health insurance coverage, which ask about health benefit coverage in the preceding year and identifies household members covered by an employer-provided health plan and the household member whose job provides the benefit.
This excerpt is from an article published in the March 1995 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. The full text of the article is available in Adobe Acrobat's Portable Document Format (PDF). See How to view a PDF file for more information.
Read abstract Download full text in PDF (332K)
Footnotes
1 This study compliments Katherine Levit, Gary L. Olin
and Suzanne W. Letsch, "Americans' Health Insurance
Coverage, 1980-1991," Health Care Financing Review,
Fall 1992, pp.31-57 that provides summary statistics on different
sources of health benefits (group, individual,and public) for
various demographic groups. However, this article looks at
changes in employer-provided group benefits for a relatively
homogeneous segment of the labor market. Also, unlike Levit et
al. , it reports multivariate estimates of the effect of
different characteristics on changes in coverage.
Within Monthly Labor Review Online:
Welcome | Current
Issue | Index | Subscribe | Archives
Exit Monthly Labor Review Online:
BLS Home | Publications
& Research Papers
