Score contribution per author:
α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count
The authors examine the effect of the Medicaid program on the labor supply and welfare participation decisions of female heads of family. A key contribution is the development of a family-specific proxy for the valuation of Medicaid benefits. The authors find that Medicaid has strong and significant effects on lab or supply and welfare participation that are negative and positive in sign, respectively, but which are concentrated in the tail of the distribution with the highest expected medical expenditures. The authors also find that the availability and level of private health insurance have very large effects opposite in sign to those of Medicaid. Copyright 1992 by MIT Press.