Health Affairs
Volume 37, Issue 10, 2018, Pages 1663-1668

Immigrants pay more in private insurance premiums than they receive in benefits (Article)

Zallman L.* , Woolhandler S. , Touw S. , Himmelstein D.U. , Finnegan K.E.
  • a Institute for Community Health, Malden, MA, United States, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States
  • b Hunter College, City University of New York, New York City, United States, Harvard Medical School, United States
  • c Institute for Community Health, United States
  • d Harvard Medical School, United States, Hunter College, City University of New York, United States
  • e Institute for Community Health, United States

Abstract

As US policy makers tackle immigration reform, knowing whether immigrants are a burden on the nation’s health care system can inform the debate. Previous studies have indicated that immigrants contribute more to Medicare than they receive in benefits but have not examined whether the roughly 50 percent of immigrants with private coverage provide a similar subsidy or even drain health care resources. Using nationally representative data, we found that immigrants accounted for 12.6 percent of premiums paid to private insurers in 2014, but only 9.1 percent of insurer expenditures. Immigrants’ annual premiums exceeded their care expenditures by $1,123 per enrollee (for a total of $24.7 billion), which offsets a deficit of $163 per US-born enrollee. Their net subsidy persisted even after ten years of US residence. In 2008–14, the surplus premiums of immigrants totaled $174.4 billion. These findings suggest that policies curtailing immigration could reduce the numbers of “actuarially desirable” people with private insurance, thereby weakening the risk pool. © 2018 Project HOPE.

Author Keywords

[No Keywords available]

Index Keywords

immigrant economics insurance health insurance human immigration trends middle aged statistics and numerical data Aged Insurance, Health Surveys and Questionnaires Young Adult United States health care cost migrant Humans Adolescent Infant, Newborn male Emigrants and Immigrants preschool child female Infant Child, Preschool Health Expenditures newborn questionnaire Article adult migration Emigration and Immigration Child
Link
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85054083815&doi=10.1377%2fhlthaff.2018.0309&partnerID=40&md5=4fe69af02d6808da305e93700a316daf
DOI: 10.1377/hlthaff.2018.0309
ISSN: 02782715
Cited by: 1
Original Language: English