Working Paper: NBER ID: w19268
Authors: David M. Cutler; Kaushik Ghosh; Mary Beth Landrum
Abstract: The question of whether morbidity is being compressed into the period just before death has been at the center of health debates in the United States for some time. Compression of morbidity would lead to longer life but less rapid medical spending increases than if life extension were accompanied by expanding morbidity. Using nearly 20 years of data from the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey, we examine how health is changing by time period until death. We show that functional measures of health are improving, and more so the farther away from death the person is surveyed. Disease rates are relatively constant at all times until death. On net, there is strong evidence for compression of morbidity based on measured disability, but less clear evidence based on disease-free survival.
Keywords: compression of morbidity; elderly health; disability-free life expectancy; Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey
JEL Codes: I1; J11
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| morbidity (I12) | life expectancy (J17) |
| morbidity (I12) | disabled life expectancy (J14) |
| disability (J14) | morbidity (I12) |
| disease rates (I12) | morbidity (I12) |
| disability severity (I12) | morbidity (I12) |