Financial Fragility, Medical Problems, and the Bankruptcy System
Financial Fragility, Medical Problems, and the Bankruptcy System
A significant body of research documents the volatility of household income and assets over the life cycle. The US bankruptcy system is among the policy interventions designed for such disruptions, and several million people pass through this system every year. Measures of homeownership, occupational prestige, and education indicate that they generally are middle class but have very low incomes when they file. This chapter examines the literature on medical problems among bankruptcy filings. It then explores the credit and debt management choices made by financially strapped households before they take the ultimate step of filing for bankruptcy. It focuses particularly on the management of medical bills not covered by insurance. The authors use data from the 2007 Consumer Bankruptcy Project, a nationally representative data set based on court records, written questionnaires, and telephone surveys.
Keywords: bankruptcy, Consumer Bankruptcy Project, credit, debt, foreclosure, health insurance, homeownership, medical bills, mortgages, net worth
Oxford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .
