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The Effect of the Medicaid Expansion on Dropout Rates
Author(s) -
Yeung Ryan
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
journal of school health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.851
H-Index - 86
eISSN - 1746-1561
pISSN - 0022-4391
DOI - 10.1111/josh.12937
Subject(s) - medicaid , dropout (neural networks) , percentage point , health insurance , medicine , patient protection and affordable care act , test (biology) , demographic economics , psychology , demography , actuarial science , health care , statistics , mathematics , business , economics , computer science , sociology , economic growth , paleontology , machine learning , biology
BACKGROUND This study investigates how the Medicaid Expansion of the Affordable Care Act affected state high school dropout rates. METHODS This study relies on a differences‐in‐differences estimation strategy that is common in program evaluation, especially in education. This method replicates in a regression framework a classic pre‐test post‐test comparison group quasi‐experimental design. The analysis is conducted at the state level, which reduces the precision of the estimates. RESULTS States that adopted the Medicaid Expansion had a 0.658 percentage point greater reduction in dropout rates than non‐Expansion states in the year of Medicaid implementation. A back‐of‐the‐envelope calculation suggests that if all the remaining non‐Expansion states adopted Medicaid, there would be a decrease of over 92,500 youths who drop out of high school, representing a drop of 11.2% in the number of dropouts in these states. CONCLUSION The Medicaid Expansion of the Affordable Care Act is more than just a health insurance program; it is a dropout prevention program.