Mathematica Policy Research

As part of these demonstrations, six successful interventions that overcome barriers to independent living and employment for young adults are studied in-depth. The first document gives detailed information on the design of the study's evaluation. The second summarizes the core components, services, and strategies of each demonstration project.

Money Follows the Person (MFP) programs only target 0.9% of the people that could be eligible for transitioning out of institutions each year. However, there is a potential to increase rates to 15-40% annually depending on quality of program implementation, who is targeted, and how successful states are in overcoming barriers to transitioning high-needs people. The report looks at grantee states’ potential for accomplishing this rate increase.

Mathematica created these compendia of abstracts, summaries, and references in an effort to provide to the public current and easily accessible research on the methodological issues of surveying persons with disabilities. Sources include online journals and websites, conference materials, citations from articles and books, and working papers and dissertations. Version 1, released June 2006, lists 150 resources. Version 2, released October 2008, adds 75.

Methods for evaluating MFP are mapped out in detail. The report explains the design of the analyses of implementation, impact, and outcomes. It also describes research questions to be answered and methods for tracking the 31 programs. Finally, the synthesis of information and format of the presentation of findings is discussed.

In the U.S., workers that experience disability onset are unlikely to receive return-to-work supports unless their disability is work-related or they have private disability coverage. The Pathways to Work program in the UK offers a range of supports that focus on preventing loss of work. After 18 months of evaluation, the data shows that it substantially improves outcomes. This brief offers lessons for U.S. policymakers that may pursue this strategy in the future.

This brief, the eighth in a series on working with disability, looks at the employment outcomes of participants in CommonHealth Working (CHW), Massachusetts’s Medicaid Buy-In program. Differences in post-enrollment employment rates, monthly hours worked and earnings, and private health insurance coverage are compared between new CHW enrollees previously covered by MassHealth, Massachusetts’s Medicaid program, and those without prior MassHealth coverage.

The Medicaid Buy-In (MBI), Social Security Disability Income (SSDI), and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) programs all provide workers with disabilities options to maintain health coverage if they earn too much for Medicaid or Medicare benefits. The first issue brief explains how these programs compare and interact in terms of eligibility, coverage, populations, and enrollment. The second examines how MBI participants that collect SSDI utilize SSDI work incentives.

Answering the question posed in the title is one key to evaluating Medicaid Buy-In (MBI) programs. This issue brief, the fifth in a series on workers with disabilities, compares demographics, health status, and expenditures between these groups. Significant areas of difference that were identified are race, gender, diagnoses, and expenditures.

The DMIE awards funds to states to develop, implement, and evaluate interventions that are intended to improve health care coverage and employment services for working adults with potentially disabling conditions. It allows states to offer Medicaid-equivalent coverage, employment support, and case management services in order to sustain employment. This issue brief reviews the rationale for the DMIE, the interventions of the four most recent states, evaluation, and information dissemination.

Mathematica researchers examine the effects that the Medicaid Buy-In program has had on participants’ earnings. The first brief looks at whether earnings increase after enrollment. The second profiles the workers that earn the highest wages. The last brief profiles all Buy-In participants and compares earnings data by state. Each brief analyzes the traits of the workers and different state programs to identify successful strategies.