January 23, 2019

The Uninsured Rate Has Soared Under Trump — Maybe

Today Gallup announced that the uninsured rate for all adults had reached 13.7 percent, a rise of nearly three percentage points since Donald Trump was elected:

I’m not quite sure how seriously to take this. There are various surveys of the uninsured rate, and I generally consider the CDC survey to be most accurate. However, it’s also the most out-of-date: the most recent CDC survey is from the second quarter of 2018, nearly a full year ago. The CDC and Gallup survey also measure slightly different things. That said, they produced pretty similar estimates all the way through 2016. Then they started to diverge:

So who’s right? For now, I’d put my money on the CDC, and suggest that there’s no reason to panic over Gallup’s surprisingly high number. But that’s not a sure thing. We’ll just have to wait and see if the CDC number stays flat, or if it starts to catch up to Gallup later in the year.

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