Job Lock and the Role of Public Health Insurance During Employment Transition. Sarah Hamersma, University of Florida, and Matthew Kim, University of St. Thomas.

Description

This study proposes to examine the problem of job lock and the role of public policies in alleviating job lock. The study proceeds in two parts.  First, we estimate the prevalence of job lock in a way that explicitly acknowledges the likely heterogeneity in its magnitude across different populations.  Second, we focus on populations that do not appear to experience job lock and examine their health insurance dynamics during job transitions.  We are particularly interested in understanding whether these individuals find ways of maintaining health coverage across employment transitions (perhaps using public health insurance) or whether they allow lapses in insurance coverage.  The 2004 SIPP is ideal for this study because of its oversample of low-income workers, who may be most susceptible to job lock, and because of its detailed information about employment and health insurance coverage on a monthly basis.  This research will contribute to a better understanding of the role currently played by policies that are expected to alleviate job lock, such as State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) coverage for children.  Given the increasing use of public health insurance coverage in the U.S., it is important to know whether it is being used to fill in coverage gaps created by job transitions in our system of primarily employer-provided insurance.