How Can Mutual-Aid Promote Common Health? Outpatient Cost-Sharing of Basic Medical Insurance for Employees and Health Inequality

Abstract

Abstract: Outpatient cost-sharing of basic medical insurance for employees is an inherent requirement for achieving national health. Based on the data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study from 2011 to 2020, this study empirically examines the impact of employee medical insurance outpatient mutual assistance on health inequality among middle-aged and elderly people by using methods such as the staggered double difference model, and further explores its mechanism and moderating effect. The findings show that employee medical insurance outpatient mutual assistance significantly alleviates health inequality among middle-aged and elderly people, but this alleviation effect is only reflected in the first year after policy implementation, and middle-aged and elderly people have not been able to continue to benefit. The mechanism analysis shows that employee medical insurance outpatient mutual assistance can further alleviate health inequality by leveraging the compensation effect of medical expenses and the incentive effect of health behavior. The moderation effect analysis reveals that the structural social capital will weaken the alleviating effect of employee medical insurance outpatient mutual assistance on health inequality. The heterogeneity analysis shows that the alleviation effect of outpatient cost-sharing of basic medical insurance for employees on health inequality is more pronounced in the female, elderly, and low education groups. Therefore, it is necessary to establish a dynamic adjustment mechanism for outpatient treatment, play the role of outpatient “health gatekeepers”, cultivate social capital of vulnerable groups in the middle-aged and elderly, and build a precise identification mechanism for outpatient mutual assistance, so as to promote the reform of employee medical insurance outpatient mutual assistance and release the dividends of common health.

Key words: outpatient cost-sharing of basic medical insurance for employees, health inequality, compensatory effects of medical expenditure, incentive effects of health behavior

CLC Number:

F842
R197

Chen Wei, Zhang Xin-jie. How Can Mutual-Aid Promote Common Health? Outpatient Cost-Sharing of Basic Medical Insurance for Employees and Health Inequality[J]. Journal of Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics, 2025, 0(5): 61-75.

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