The Reality of SCHIP and Uninsureds: Do SCHIP Mandatory Wait Periods Increase the Uninsured Rolls?

Due to the low risk of not insuring a healthy child for a short, finite period of time, it's plausible that SCHIP mandatory wait periods, where a child must forgo private insurance for several months before enrolling in SCHIP, do not provide enough incentive for parents to keep their children enrolled in private insurance. Using data from the 1996 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), we find that children eligible for SCHIP in states with shorter mandatory wait periods are more likely to be uninsured during the six months following the implementation of SCHIP than children in states with no mandatory wait periods. These children also have lower preventative care utilization, but there is no difference in their acute care utilization or health after one year.