As the Obama administration ponders how to further boost the percentage of Americans with health insurance, a new study suggests it may be neglecting a powerful ally: the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
A report by the Urban Institute and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation argues that the IRS could go a long way toward increasing the insured rate by identifying and informing uninsured taxpayers of the credits they qualify for.
A big chunk of the uninsured, for instance, receive the Earned Income Tax Credit because of their low income.
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Twenty-eight percent of the uninsured are eligible for Medicaid and 21 percent are eligible for a subsidized insurance policy available through the federal and state marketplace exchanges. In addition, two-thirds of uninsured children are eligible for the Children's Health Insurance Program or Medicaid.
Of those who remain uninsured and are eligible for Medicaid, two-thirds live in a home where at least one person receives some type of public benefit, which implies semi-regular contact with a government agency. Similarly, just over half of those eligible for marketplace subsidies live in such a household.
The government should deploy the agencies that administer other benefits to use their regular contact with beneficiaries to enroll them in health plans, the study argues. Some states have already championed such efforts.
"As is the case with public schools, legal aid programs and others involved with providing legal assistance to low-income families are not resourced to do enrollment assistance themselves, but they could potentially be used as a conduit to connect those with whom they come in contact with professional assisters," the study said.
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