Spillover Effects of Uninsurance: The Effects of Neighborhood Levels of Uninsurance on Collective Efficacy

Tara McKay, University of California, Los Angeles
Stefan Timmermans, University of California, Los Angeles

The lack of health insurance is traditionally considered a problem faced by individuals or their families. However, because of the geographically-bounded organization and funding of health care in the United States, differences in the proportion of uninsured individuals in a neighborhood may affect everyone living there. Recent research has shown how the proportion of uninsured individuals in a neighborhood directly affects individual health and health care delivery, even for the insured. Using data from the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey, this paper extends work on the spillover effects of uninsurance by examining other aspects of social life that may be affected by high levels of uninsurance, such as collective efficacy. In a series of two-level random intercept models, we find that neighborhood levels of uninsurance independently predict collective efficacy and frequency of help from neighbors, controlling for other neighborhood- and individual-level factors.