Description:

Katherine Meckel (UCSD): “Dependent Coverage and Parental Job Mobility: Evidence from the Affordable Care Act” with Hanna Bae and Maggie Shi 

Abstract: A common feature of employer-sponsored insurance is coverage for dependents.
While prior evidence suggests that employees trade o  job mobility for their own cov-
erage--a phenomenon known as job lock--there is less evidence on the extent to which employees value dependent coverage. This study examines the e ects of an ex- pansion in dependent coverage using a large panel of private insurance claims that links family members and records job tenure. We develop a regression discontinuity design that exploits variation in coverage length by dependent birth date. We  nd that a one percent increase in dependent coverage likelihood increases parental job retention by 0.28 percent. The elasticity of parental job duration to dependent coverage duration is 0.09. We  nd larger elasticities for parents on plans without additional dependents, for parents nearing early retirement age, and for parents of dependents with higher pre-period medical spending.