JSIT21-04: The Impact of Medicaid Enrollment Expansion on the Health Well-being of SSI and SSDI Beneficiaries

Medicaid is a necessary source of supplemental health care coverage for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) beneficiaries, however, there are different regulations in place regarding eligibility to receive Medicaid for these lower income people in different states across the country. The SSI and SSDI beneficiaries are more often in need for Medicaid coverage since they are more vulnerable given their relatively low income, standard of living, and health condition. Therefore, these regulations have an effect on the health of SSI and SSDI recipients in the states with more restrictive Medicaid policies (e.g., separate Medicaid application).
In the literature, there are some studies on the effect of automatic enrollment for Medicaid coverage in comparison with separate-application policy regimes to understand the impact of different regimes on the number of state-wide enrollments and among different demographics. However, they have not considered the effect of the expansion of automatic enrollment and separate application of Medicaid on the health-wellbeing of SSI and SSDI beneficiaries while considering regulations in different states.
In this project, we will use data from SSA’s Disability Analysis File (DAF) linked to Medicaid information from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) along with American Community Survey (ACS) to understand the effect of the state-wide expansion of automatic enrollment on SSI and SSDI beneficiaries to provide the first descriptive study of the health well-being of SSI and SSDI beneficiaries who have Medicaid coverage. This research will form the basis to understand the causal effects of Medicaid policy regimes on the health well-being of SSI and SSDI recipients in different states.