Codes

This variable is not available for any of the currently selected samples.

Description

CAIDLW identifies persons who had health insurance coverage from Medicaid during the previous week. In a prior question about health insurance coverage during the previous year, interviewers defined Medicaid as "the government assistance program that pays for health care" and mentioned both Medicaid and the Medicaid programs specific to the state where the household was located.

Medicaid pays for medical assistance to low-income families with dependent children and to aged, blind, or permanently and totally disabled individuals with incomes insufficient to meet the costs of medical services. For more information about this government program, or to identify persons who had Medicaid insurance coverage during the previous year, see CAIDLY.

CAIDLW is one of a series of variables relating to current insurance coverage included in the CPS during 1996 and 1997 only. Interviewers first asked whether the individual was covered by any type of health plan during the previous week. If the answer was affirmative, they asked whether current insurance coverage was of the same type as coverage during the previous year, and then collected information on up to five types of health insurance coverage for the previous week.

Persons covered by any insurance (regardless of type) during the previous week are identified in COVERLW. Other variables dealing with health insurance coverage of specific types during the previous week are: CARELW (for Medicare); CHAMPLW (for CHAMPUS and CHAMPVA); GROUPLW (for employment-based group health plans, via one's own plan or as a dependent); IHSLW (for Indian Health Service or other, not otherwise specified, government coverage); MILVALW (for Military Health Care or Veterans Administration health care); PRIPURLW (for privately-purchased, not employment-based health insurance); and OUTOTHLW (for coverage via the plan of someone outside the household, or from some other source).

Comparability

User Note: For a set of variables that addresses many of the comparability issues in the CPS health insurance measures, see the summary health insurance variables created by the University of Minnesota's State Health Access Data Assistance Center.

This variable is comparable across years.

Universe

Flags

Unharmonized Variables

• UH_CURCV1_A1