Racial and ethnic differences in health insurance for the near elderly.

Recent increases in the number of Americans without health insurance have spurred research designed to identify factors related to noncoverage. One age group receiving recent attention is the near elderly, persons 55 through 64 years of age. This paper brings together health insurance research on the near elderly with that focused on racial and ethnic differences in coverage. Logistic regression is used to study the factors that predict whether or not an individual has health insurance coverage. Results indicate that even after accounting for health insurance correlates such as education and income, non-Hispanic African Americans and Hispanics have a significantly higher probability of not having coverage than their non-Hispanic white counterparts. The results are discussed in terms of recent efforts to reshape public policy regarding health insurance, especially proposals that would affect the Medicare program.