This article estimates the impact of the 2006 Massachusetts health reform on the decision of individuals to retire early. Using data from the American Community Survey that spans 2004 through 2012, the authors estimate difference-in-differences models for retirement using individuals from other northeastern states as the control group. The estimates suggest that the reform led women to increase early retirement from full-time work by 1.1 percentage points (from a base of 4.8%) and to increase part-time work by 1.1 percentage points (from a base of 30%). Though no significant effects were found for men overall, the estimates imply that the reform led to an increase in retirement and part-time work among lower-income men.
AbadieAlbertoDiamondAlexisHainmuellerJens. 2010. Synthetic control methods for comparative case studies: Estimating the effect of California’s tobacco control program. Journal of the American Statistical Association105(490): 493–505.
2.
AlemayehuBerhanuWarnerKenneth E.2004. The lifetime distribution of health care costs. Health Services Research39(3): 627–42.
3.
AndersonKathryn H.BurkhauserRichard. V.1983. A jointly determined retirement decision model: The interaction of health and work choices. Working Paper No. 83-W08. Vanderbilt University.
4.
BazzoliGloria J.1985. The early retirement decision: New empirical evidence on the influence of health. Journal of Human Resources20(2): 214–34.
5.
BlauDavid M.GilleskieDonna B.2001. Retiree health insurance and the labor force behavior of older men in the 1990s. Review of Economics and Statistics83(1): 64–80.
6.
———. 2006. Health insurance and retirement of married couples. Journal of Applied Econometrics21(7): 935–53.
7.
———. 2008. The role of retiree health insurance in the employment behavior of older men. International Economic Review49(2): 475–514.
8.
BoskinMichael J.1977. Social Security and retirement decisions. Economic Inquiry15(1): 1–25.
9.
BoundJohn. 1991. Self-reported versus objective measures of health in retirement models. Journal of Human Resources26(1): 106–38.
10.
BoundJohnSchoenbaumMichaelWaidmannTimothy. 1995. Race and education differences in disability status and labor force attachment in the Health and Retirement Survey. Journal of Human Resources30: S227–S267.
11.
BoundJohnStinebricknerTodd R.WaidmannTimothy. 2010. Health, economic resources and the work decisions of older men. Journal of Econometrics156(1): 106–29.
12.
BoyleMelissa A.LaheyJoanna N.2010. Health insurance and the labor supply decisions of older workers: Evidence from a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs expansion. Journal of Public Economics94(7–8): 467–78.
13.
BurkhauserRichard V.QuinnJoseph F.1983. Is mandatory retirement overrated? Evidence from the 1970s. Journal of Human Resources18(3): 337–58.
14.
ClevesMario A.2002. From the help desk: Comparing areas under receiver operating characteristics curves from two or more probit or logit models. STATA Journal2: 301–13.
15.
CoileCourtneyLevinePhillip B.2010. Reconsidering Retirement: How Losses and Layoffs Affect Older Workers. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.
CrosonRachelGneezyUri. 2009. Gender differences in preferences. Journal of Economic Literature47(2): 1–27.
18.
DiamondPeterHausmanJerry. 1984. The retirement and unemployment behavior of older men. In AaronHenry J.BurtlessGary (Eds.), Retirement and Economic Behavior, pp. 97–129. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution.
19.
FitzpatrickMaria D.2013. Retiree health insurance for public school employees: Does it affect retirement? NBER Working Paper No. 19524. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
20.
FrenchEricJonesJohn B.2011. The effects of health insurance and self-insurance on retirement behavior. Econometrica79(3): 693–732.
21.
GordonRoger H.BlinderAlan S.1980. Market wages, reservation wages, and retirement decisions. Journal of Public Economics14(2): 277–308.
22.
GruberJonathanMadrianBrigitte C.1995. Health-insurance availability and the retirement decision. American Economic Review85(4): 938–48.
23.
GustmanAlan L.SteinmeierThomas L.1986. A structural retirement model. Econometrica54(3): 555–84.
24.
———. 2005. The Social Security early entitlement age in a structural model of retirement and wealth. Journal of Public Economics89(2–3): 441–63.
25.
HausmanJerry A.WiseDavid A.1985. Social Security, health status, and retirement. In WiseDavid A. (Ed.), Pensions, Labor, and Individual Choice, pp. 159–92. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
26.
HeimBradley T.LurieIthai Z.2014. Does health reform affect self-employment? Evidence from Massachusetts. Small Business Economics43(4): 917–30.
27.
———. 2015. Does health reform lead to increased job mobility? Evidence from Massachusetts. American Journal of Health Economics1(3): 374–98.
28.
JohnsonRichard W.DavidoffAmy J.PereseKevin. 2003. Health insurance costs and early retirement decisions. Industrial and Labor Relations Review56(4): 716–29.
29.
KapurKanikaRogowskiJeannette. 2007. The role of health insurance in joint retirement among married couples. Industrial and Labor Relations Review60(3): 397–407.
30.
KolstadJonathan T.KowalskiAmanda E.2012. Mandate-based health reform and the labor market: Evidence from the Massachusetts reform. NBER Working Paper No. 17933. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
31.
KreiderBrent. 1999. Latent work disability and reporting bias. Journal of Human Resources34(4): 734–69.
32.
LinLeeKai.2014. Do state non-group health market regulations affect early retirement? Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Indiana University at Bloomington.
33.
Lo SassoAnthony T.2008. An examination of state non-group and small-group health insurance regulations. AEI Working Paper No. 140. Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.
34.
MartonJamesWoodburyStephen A.2009. Retiree health benefits and the decision to retire. Kalamazoo, MI: W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research.
35.
MurphyJohn L.HugginsBrent. 2015. Retirement income among American Indians and Alaska Natives in the American Community Survey. Research and Statistics Note: Office of Retirement and Disability Policy/Office of Research, Evaluation and Statistics, United States Social Security Administration.
36.
NiuXiaotong. 2014. Health insurance and self-employment: Evidence from Massachusetts. ILR Review67(4): 1235–73.
37.
QuinnJoseph F.1977. Microeconomic determinants of early retirement: A cross-sectional view of white married men. Journal of Human Resources12(3): 329–46.
RogowskiJeannetteKarolyLynn. 2000. Health insurance and retirement behavior: Evidence from the Health and Retirement Survey. Journal of Health Economics19(4): 529–39.
40.
RustJohnPhelanChristopher. 1997. How Social Security and Medicare affect retirement behavior in a world of incomplete markets. Econometrica65(4): 781–831.
41.
StockJames H.WiseDavid A.1990. Pensions, the option value of work, and retirement. Econometrica58(5): 1151–80.
42.
WoolhandlerSteffieHimmelsteinDavid U.2007. Consumer directed healthcare: Except for the healthy and wealthy it’s unwise. Journal of General Internal Medicine22: 879–81.
