Overview of Michigan Health Insurance Coverage and The Uninsured

Overview

Health insurance coverage is critical to keeping Michigan's residents healthy. Studies have shown that having over one million Michiganians without insurance coverage is detrimental to both to those without coverage, as well as to those who have health insurance.

This report focuses primarily on three categories of Michigan's non-elderly residents: the uninsured, those with employer-based coverage, and individuals who purchase their own insurance coverage.

Overall, Michigan residents compare favorably to residents of other states for having some type of health insurance. Uninsured rates for Michigan residents have been lower than the national average since 1987, the first year in which comparable state data became available. The percentage of Michigan adults without health insurance coverage increased in Michigan between 1999-2001 and 2004-2006 from 11.9 percent to 14.8 percent; meanwhile the proportion of uninsured children fell from 7 percent in 1999-2001 to 5.2 percent in 2004-2006. Similar trends were seen in the rest of the nation, but with larger numbers. Nationally adult uninsurance went from 17.5 percent in 1999-2001 to 19.9 percent in 2004-2006, while child rates of uninsurance fell from 23.4 percent in 1999-2001 to 11 percent in 2004-2006.

Strong employer-based coverage is key to Michigan's relatively low uninsured rate. Employer-based coverage rates in Michigan are continually above the national average. Nearly seven out of 10 (69.2 percent) Michigan residents have health insurance through their employer, while the national rate is 62.7 percent. Individually purchased coverage makes up only 6.4 percent of health insurance coverage in Michigan; the rate is 6.9 percent nationally.

This report explores in greater depth the characteristics of the uninsured and individuals with selected health coverage for the non-elderly population (under age 65). Focus is on the non-elderly because persons aged 65 and older are by and large insured, often with coverage options such as Medicare, which are not uniformly available to the rest of the population.

Additional data resources on health insurance coverage in Michigan can be found at www.michigan.gov/spg.