DO PEOPLE SHIFT THEIR USE OF HEALTH-SERVICES OVER TIME TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF INSURANCE

This paper provides a test of the hypothesis that people shift their c onsumption of health services to time periods when they have more gene rous insurance coverage, in order to take advantage of third-party pay ment. We use data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation to compare utilization rates for people in transition between being in sured and being uninsured to those of people who are continuously insu red and continuously uninsured. We find little support for the hypothe sis that people anticipate changes in their insurance status and arran ge their health care consumption accordingly. (C) 1998 Elsevier Scienc e B.V.