This paper examines the incidence of the cost burden associated with expanding public health insurance to low-income adults in the context of the Affordable Care Act. Using data from the Medical Expenditures Panel Survey (MEPS), I exploit exogenous variation in Medicaid eligibility rules across states, income groups and time. I find that public…

Over 700,000 children throughout the U.S. have received insurance coverage through welcome mat effects of Medicaid expansion, including children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Utilizing health workforce data from the Health Resources and Services Administration, we examined workforce growth (2008-2017) among three types of health providers…

Budgets are moral documents, reflecting our priorities as a nation by deciding where to allocate resources. Congress is targeting cuts and policy changes that limit access to health care, nutrition programs, and basic financial stability for millions of children, including Medicaid, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and the…

This study examines autism diagnosis prevalence within the New York City (NYC) Universal Pre-K for All (UPK) program expansion into racially, ethnically, and socioeconomically diverse NYC neighborhoods. Here, it is hypothesized that racial/ethnic differences in autism diagnoses may close as more children are referred for testing by UPK programs,…

This "Building Capacity for Change" "playbook" highlights practices and strategies that proved to be effective in supporting the rollout and implementation of certain programs under the New York State Department of Health's First 1,000 Days on Medicaid Initiative, a series of evidence-based reforms aimed at improving health and…

Children who receive copious amounts of language stimulation from caring adults are likely to develop strong language skills, whereas children who receive limited language stimulation may experience delays. Little is known about the language stimulation strategies that families prefer to use. This mixed-methods study investigated families'…

Weakening federal assistance programs that provide children with affordable health care, nutritious food, stable housing, and early childhood education by imposing funding cuts, work requirements, unreasonable time limits, and other unnecessary bureaucratic barriers undermines access to services for low income families and undercuts opportunities…

Among all children under 18 years in the United States, 38 percent live in low-income families and 17 percent--approximately one in five--are poor. This means that children are overrepresented among the nation's poor; they represent 23 percent of the population but comprise 32 percent of all people in poverty. Many more children live in families…

Among all children under 18 years in the US, 38 percent live in low-income families and 17 percent-- approximately one in five--are poor. This means that children are overrepresented among our nation's poor; they represent 23 percent of the population but comprise 32 percent of all people in poverty. Many more children live in families with…

While COVID-19 is capable of infecting anyone, the level of risk is far from equal. Data show that Black and Latino communities, already suffering from deep-rooted economic and health inequalities, have borne the brunt of the pandemic. Latinas, in particular, have suffered some of the most egregious economic and health disparities over the past…

This dissertation consists of three independent chapters in applied microeconomics. In the first chapter, I study the causal effect impact of early life circumstances on adult psychological well-being using the property reform in China as a positive and policy driven change in economic resources in early life. Exploiting the staggered adoption of…

Hispanics have the lowest colorectal cancer (CRC) screening rates of all racial/ethnic groups and comprise the largest proportion of low-income manual laborers in the nation. We partnered with businesses to implement a community health worker (CHW)-led intervention among Hispanic workers in service-related and manual labor occupations, which often…

This appendix describes the data and methodology used to estimate federal program and tax expenditures on children in "Kids' Share 2021: Report on Federal Expenditures on Children through 2020 and Future Projections" (ED616306). The following contents are included in this appendix: (1) Introduction; (2) Summary Table of Multipliers and…

Publicly funded adult health insurance through the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has had positive effects on low-income adults. We examine whether the ACA's Medicaid expansions influenced child development and family functioning in low-income households. We use a difference-in-differences framework that exploits cross-state policy variation and focus…

Previous literature documents a strong relationship between food insecurity and mental health, and also examines the impact of safety net programs on food insecurity. However, little is known about the intersection between mental health, safety net participation, and food insecurity. In this research, we use a multi-program safety net calculator…