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FACTS ON POLICY: Health Insurance: Definition of the Uninsured September 18, 2007
Those without health insurance constitute a fluid population that measured between 31 million and 55 million people in 2006. There are three common ways to measure the uninsured population. The first is a point estimate—the number of uninsured at a specific point in time (in this case, the day that the Census Bureau conducted the survey on the uninsured). In 2006, that number was roughly 44 million people, or 15 percent of the population. This number is most often cited by the media. A second measure is the number of long-term uninsured—those without insurance for more than a year. In 2006, 31 million people—11 percent of the general population—had been uninsured for more than a year. In percentage terms, the number has not fluctuated much during the past ten years, although, as the general population has grown, the number of long-term uninsured has grown proportionately. The third measure is the number of people who were uninsured at any given point in the 12 months before the survey was conducted. In 2006, 55 million people, or 19 percent of the population, had been uninsured for at least part of that year (that number includes the long-term uninsured). Those three measures of the uninsured population are not mutually exclusive. Related fact: Health-care expenditures (February 20, 2007) Related fact: Trends and characteristics of the uninsured (October 2, 2007) Related fact: The long-term uninsured (October 16, 2007)
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