Data

This report is an annual summary of the latest statistics on the older population of the United States. It covers 16 topical areas including population, income and poverty, living arrangements, education, and health.

This presentation describes Minnesota's approach to establishing and maintaining their statewide resource database, MinnesotaHelp.info. Also included are handouts on specific areas for maintaining the website, such as external data investigation, migration, and address matching.

Fifty-nine participants in three cohorts of training for ACT Peer Support Specialist (PSS) were surveyed on the last day of their training on a number of outcome variables, including current employment status. Participants were asked about motivations for training and seeking employment as a peer support specialist, quality of life, and empowerment. Review the survey questions and results

Since Medicaid is funded by states as well as the federal government, it has a considerable impact on state budgets. When considering Medicaid’s impact on state budgets and other state spending priorities, it is important to distinguish between total spending on Medicaid and spending with state funds. Often this distinction is not made. This brief examines the different measures and provides data on how much each state spends on Medicaid.

The national percentage of Medicaid spending on home and community-based services (HCBS) has more than doubled from 1992 to 2004. This report presents a summary of the main trends to emerge for the three Medicaid HCBS programs and the results of a survey of policies such as eligibility criteria and waiting lists.

This report examines experiences of Beneficiaries, State Vocational Rehabilitation Agencies (VR), Employment Networks (ENs), and the Social Security Administration (SSA) during the TTW rollout period from 2002–2004. Overall, Mathematica found that the Ticket to Work Program did not have a significant impact on the way VR does business or on the practices of ENs in the community. TTW did, however, begin a fundamental shift within SSA toward focusing on improving the earnings of beneficiaries.

This final report summarizes the findings from five years of research on how each of the three demonstration states implemented its program, and on how the programs have affected the consumers who participated, the consumers’ paid and unpaid caregivers, and the costs to Medicaid. The analysis is based on an experimental design to ensure that the estimates of program effects are unbiased, and has sample sizes that are adequate to detect program effects of policy-relevant magnitudes.

The out-of-pocket cost of caring for an aging parent or spouse averages $5,531 a year, according to the nation's first in-depth study of such expenses, a sum that is more than double previous estimates and more than the average American household spends each year on health care and entertainment combined. This Evercare/NAC study found that as many as 17 million people care for a loved one 50 years or older and are spending more than 10 percent of their annual income on caregiving expenses.

In 2006, Maine’s Medicaid Infrastructure Grant was awarded funds to provide outreach about Medicare’s new prescription drug coverage to MaineCare Workers with Disabilities Option dual eligible members. Methods for raising awareness and education about the transition to Medicare Part D were implemented. To identify the usefulness of outreach efforts and to learn about experiences with transitioning prescription drug coverage, a telephone survey was conducted. A report highlights the findings.

A series of presentations, funded by the MI-CEO grant, discuss a variety of issues related to the employment of people with disabilities in Massachusetts. Topics covered include: rates of unemployment, barriers to employment, ways to overcome barriers, the relationship of programs and services (e.g., MassHealth and Medicaid Buy-In) to employment efforts, recommendations from agency leaders, and implications for MI-CEO.