School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia; Department of Health Services Research & Policy, Australian National University, Australia; Centre for the Business and Economics of Health, University of Queensland, Australia.
School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia; Centre for the Business and Economics of Health, University of Queensland, Australia.
J Health Econ. 2023 Mar;88:102737. doi: 10.1016/j.jhealeco.2023.102737. Epub 2023 Jan 28.
Do wealthier individuals use more health care services than those less affluent? Our paper addresses this question by examining the relationship between housing wealth and health care utilization. Exploiting fluctuations in the U.S. housing market, we estimate the effect of unanticipated wealth shocks on older adults' health care utilization, using county-year variation in house prices to construct an instrumental variable. Using data from the 1996-2016 Health and Retirement Study, we find that an increase in wealth significantly increases numbers of doctor visits, prescription drugs, outpatient surgery, and dental services. Notably, an economic downturn like that in the Great Recession, when housing wealth declined by 16 percent on average, could reduce the utilization of prescription drugs by 0.4 percent, outpatient services by 0.5 percent, dental care by 0.6 percent, and numbers of doctor visits by 0.5 visits annually.
富裕人群比不那么富裕的人群使用更多的医疗服务吗？我们通过考察住房财富与医疗保健利用之间的关系来回答这个问题。我们利用美国住房市场的波动，使用房价的县-年变化来构建工具变量，估计意外财富冲击对老年人医疗保健利用的影响。我们使用来自 1996-2016 年健康与退休研究的数据，发现财富的增加显著增加了医生就诊次数、处方药、门诊手术和牙科服务的数量。值得注意的是，像大衰退那样的经济衰退，住房财富平均下降 16%，可能会使处方药的利用率降低 0.4%，门诊服务降低 0.5%，牙科护理降低 0.6%，以及每年医生就诊次数减少 0.5 次。
