Distributional Effects of Social Welfare and Healthcare in Finland: A Simulation Study
In addition to morbidity, availability of services, and wealth, a household’s social welfare and healthcare costs depend on current legislation defining the prices for services and medicines. The objective of this study is to produce a more comprehensive evaluation of the effects of social welfare and healthcare costs on the livelihood of households. Furthermore, we analyse the distributional effects of public healthcare expenditures. The research questions are:
- How has the legislation, and changes thereto, on client charges in healthcare and social welfare affected population poverty and the calculated need for social assistance?
- How have the changes in legislation affected the use of social welfare and health services and medicine consumption?
- How do social welfare and healthcare costs affect livelihood and poverty, especially among the elderly?
- What is the distributional effect of public social welfare and healthcare costs?
The SISU model by Statistics Finland is used for the microsimulation of social security and taxation. In this study, the SISU model is complemented with register data on households’ healthcare costs. The data comprises data in the SISU model on selected individuals, Hilmo register data from the National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), and Kela’s payment data on health insurance reimbursements (medicines, doctor’s fees, dental care, private examinations and treatment, travel costs) from 2016 to 2018. Kela’s data are forwarded to Statistics Finland as total data, from which the sampling is done on individuals in the SISU sample. The data are combined in Statistics Finland and used in their remote access system. Only researchers participating in the study have access to the system. Research permits are applied from Kela, THL, and Statistics Finland. A privacy statement and impact evaluations are drawn when applying for the permits, and we will notify the Data Protection Ombudsman about the study together with THL.
Researchers
- Katri Aaltonen, Leading Researcher
- Pekka Heino
Project Implementation Period
1.1.2019–31.12.2023. The project has ended.
