@techreport{NBERw11179,
 title = "Out-of-Pocket Health Spending Between Low- and High-Income Populations: Who is at Risk of Having High Financial Burdens?",
 author = "Yu-Chu Shen and Joshua McFeeters",
 institution = "National Bureau of Economic Research",
 type = "Working Paper",
 series = "Working Paper Series",
 number = "11179",
 year = "2005",
 month = "March",
 URL = "http://www.nber.org/papers/w11179",
 abstract = {We examined characteristics of people with little, moderate, and high burden of out-of-pocket health spending separately for low-income (below 200% of Federal Poverty Line) and higher-income populations. We find that public insurance appears to offer the best financial protection against high out-of-pocket burden. People with private non-group coverage, regardless of their income levels, have the highest risk of being exposed to high out-of-pocket burden. Low-income adults with employer-sponsored insurance are also more likely to be in high burden group than the low-income uninsured adults. For higher-income families, having a family member in fair or poor health is another significant risk factor to increase the likelihood of high out-of-pocket burden. Increasing presence of HMO and Federally Qualified Health Centers appear to have lowered the odds of being in the high-burden category relative to low-burden category, especially for the low-income group.

<p>**Circulation of this paper has been halted.  Please contact the author (yshen@nps.edu) for further information.**},
}