• Journal of the Korean Society of Child Welfare
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• no.36
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• pp.65-99
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• 2011

The main purpose of this study is to analyze the relationship between child poverty rate and family policy expenditure of welfare states (focusing on OECD countries). We analyzed not only the total social & family policy expenditures but the components of the family policy expenditure. OECD SOCX and calculated data from the LIS & OECD data were utilized for child and family policy expenditures and the poverty rate. One-way correlation and cluster analysis were employed for the analysis. The analytic results are as follows: Southern European and Anglo-Saxon countries' child poverty rates were higher and Scandinavian countries' child poverty rates were lower than any other clusters. The countries with high child poverty rate had higher child poverty rate than the entire nation's poverty rate, but Scandinavian countries' child poverty rate was lower. There was a strong correlation between family policy expenditure and child poverty rate. Especially the service expenditure and leave benefit expenditure were highly correlated with child poverty rate. On the other hand, cash expenditure was not significantly correlated with child poverty rate. We can suggest the policy implications from these results. Based on the analytic results, policy implications that the government should increase the family policy budget, especially the budget for family services and leave benefit to decrease child poverty rate and should make effort to support the employment of parents through policies such as active labor market strategies can be suggested.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.206-219
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• 2019

This paper aims to demonstrate current health expenditure (CHE) and National Health Accounts of the years 2018 constructed according to the SHA2011, which is a manual for System of Health Accounts (SHA) that was published jointly by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Eurostat, and World Health Organization in 2011. Comparison is made with international trends by collecting and analyzing health accounts of OECD member countries. Particularly, scale and trends of the total CHE financing as well as public-private mix are parsed in depth. In the case of private financing, estimation of total expenditures for (revenues by) provider groups (HP) is made from both survey on the benefit coverage rate of National Health Insurance (by National Health Insurance Service) and Economic Census and Service Industry Census (by National Statistical Office); and other pieces of information from Korean Health Panel Study, etc. are supplementarily used to allocate those totals into functional classifications. CHE was 144.4 trillion won in 2018, which accounts for 8.1% of Korea's gross domestic product (GDP). It was a big increase of 12.8 trillion won, or 9.7%, from the previous year. GDP share of Korean CHE has already been close to the average of OECD member countries. Government and compulsory schemes' share (or public share), 59.8% of the CHE in 2018, is much lower than the OECD average of 73.6%. 'Transfers from government domestic revenue' share of total revenue of health financing was 16.9% in Korea, lower than the other social insurance countries. When it comes to 'compulsory contributory health financing schemes,' 'transfers from government domestic revenue' share of 13.5% was again much lower compared to Japan (43.0%) and Belgium (30.1%) with social insurance scheme.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.59 no.4
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• pp.297-317
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• 2007

In this article, I want to demonstrate wage equality increases support for welfare expenditures while the wage equality depends on how labour market institutions are organized. In other words, this study tries to show that there can be institutional complementarity between inequality-reducing labour market institutions and generous social policy. In the first section, I develop a theoretical models which deal(1) how the inequality of income affects the political support for welfare expenditure(2) how the configurations of labour market institutions affect income inequality in the labour market. In the following section, this study tests the models with data on welfare spending, configurations of labour market institutions, and the inequality of wage and salaries in 14 welfare states from 1980 to 1995. Empirical analysis also provides support for key implications of the models. These models and empirical findings may show that the institutional complementarity stems from the interdependence of institutional influences on actors' decision-making. Moreover, this study suggests welfare policy are always considered with labour market institutions.

• 한국사회정책
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.243-280
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• 2018

This paper examines the discussion on the income-led growth known as the core economic strategy of Moon's administration in terms of Korean welfare regime. Although the income-led growth strategies have presented various issues, the income-led growth strategy seems to be a timely alternative discourse that emphasizes the demand side, considering supply-oriented growth strategies have caused long-term recession and deepening of inequality. It is important that the income-led growth strategy places social expenditures as an important growth engine for virtuous cycle of production and consumption. However, this paper has confirmed that simply raising wages and increasing social expenditure do not increase the aggregate demand and production. Moreover, empirical studies have shown that the inclusion of external sectors and liabilities into the analysis weakens the wage-led growth of the Korean economy. For this reason, this study concluded that the government's sophisticated policy intervention is necessary for the increase of real wages and social spending to be economic growth.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.37-63
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• 2010

Public expenditures on long-term care are a matter of concern for Korea as in many other countries. The expenditure is expected to accelerate and to put pressure on public budgets, adding to that arising from insufficient retirement schemes and other forms of social spending. This study tried to foresee how much health care spending could increase in the future considering demographic and non-demographic factors as the drivers of expenditure. Previous projections of future long-term expenditure were mainly based on a given relation between spending and age structure. However, although demographic factors will surely put upward pressure on long-term care costs, other non-demographic factors, such as labor cost increase and availability of informal care, should be taken into account as well. Also, the possibility of dynamic link between health status and longevity gains needs to be considered. The model in this study is cell-base and consists of three main parts. The first part estimated the numbers of elderly people with different levels of health status by age group, gender, household type. The second part estimated the levels of long-term care services required, by attaching a probability of receiving long-term care services to each cell using from the sample from current year. The third part of the model estimated long-term care expenditure, along the demographic and non-demographic factors' change in various scenarios. Public spending on long-term care could rise from the current level of 0.2~0.3% of GDP to around 0.44~2.30% by 2040.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.95-106
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• 2016

A new manual of System of Health Accounts (SHA) 2011, was published jointly by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Eurostat, and World Health Organization in 2011. This offers more complete coverage than the previous version, SHA 1.0, within the functional classification in areas such as prevention and a precise approach for tracking financing in the health care sector using the new classification of financing schemes. This paper aims to demonstrate current health expenditure (CHE) and National Health Accounts of the years 1970-2014 constructed according to the SHA2011. Data sources for public financing include budget and settlement documents of the government, various statistics from the National Health Insurance, and others. In the case of private financing, an estimation of total revenue by provider groups is made from the Economic Census data and the household income and expenditure survey, Korean healthcare panel study, etc. are used to allocate those totals into functional classifications. CHE was 105 trillion won in 2014, which accounts for 7.1% of Korea's gross domestic product. It was a big increase of 7.7 trillion won, 7.9%, from the previous year. Public share (government and compulsory schemes) accounting for 56.5% of the CHE in 2014 was still much lower than the OECD average of about 73%. With these estimates, it is possible to compare health expenditures of Korea and other countries better. Awareness and appreciation of the need and gains from applying SHA2011 for the health expenditure classification are expected to increase as OECD health expenditure figures get more frequently quoted among health policy makers.

• Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.179-194
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• 1991

Despite its universal coverage of health insurance, the rural health insurance program(RHIP) stands at the crossroads in Korea. The RHIP has weaknesses in stability of financing, problems of inequities in the provision of health services and has suffered from high cost of running the program. The author has analyzed these problems from the perspective of health insurance policy and presented several options for improvement. First of all, this study urged the importance of a firm Governmental commitment of RHIP with the 50% subsidization of contributions as the Government had promised, instead of the current 40%. This can be justified from the 20% subsidization by the Government for the contributions of private school teachers and their dependents, who belong to richer segments of the population. Second, various cost containment measures ought to be sought curbing the rising demand for medical through strengthening health education and increasing individual responsibility, and tightening the claim review process. Third, this study requires the Government to run a demonstration project on the introduction of case payment system for primary health care. Fourth introducing an income-related cost sharing scheme is another possibility. Reforming the cost sharing formula for large medical expenditures is recommendable for a beginning. This measure can take the form of tax credit for medical expenditures of the poor. Fifth, the degree of financial adjustment among health insurance plans should be levelled up for enhancing stability of RHIP and social solidarity. Sixth, health policy should be redirected toward development of rural health resources and higher priority should be put on relieving difficulties in access to care. Seventh. the insurance plan owned-hospital needs to be developed or provision of health services in the medically underserved areas, and the need of such facilities is particularly acute for geriatric care, rehabilitation and renal dialysis, etc. Eighth, more generous insurance benefits are required of the elderly who are suffering the most : elimination of the maximum 180 days of benefit period and provision of glasses and artificial dentures, etc. Ninth. the economies of scale principle is working for the operating expenses of regional self-employed insurance plan. Thus, measures should be instituted to pursue an optimum size of health insurance plans. Lastly, excessive dependence on exclusion items is an evil so that some radical remedies are urgently required to cut them.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.81-96
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• 2009

The expansion of long-term care hospitals (LTCHs) is expected to contribute to meeting the long-term care needs of the elderly with chronic diseases in a rapidly aging society. It is also expected to increase efficiency of health resource use and decrease elderly health expenditures by transferring patients from acute care hospitals (ACHs) to LTCHs. This study aimed to empirically examine how the expansion of LTCHs had influences on the length of hospitalization of the elderly in ACHs. Panel regression analysis was employed as an analytic tool using data of the National Health Insurance and the National Statistical Office from 2002 to 2006. The expansion of LTCHs was measured as location quotient (LQ) of LTCHs, denoting the share of LTCHs in a large city or province relative to the share of LTCHs at the national level. In addition, per capita GRDP (gross regional domestic product) and the proportion of population over 65 were included as control variables. The main findings are as follows. First, it was observed that LQ of LTCHs showed a statistically significant negative association with the length of hospitalization of the elderly in ACHs. Second, the negative correlation was evident among general hospitals with over 100 beds while it was not among hospitals with less than 100 beds. Third, LQ of LTCHs had more influences among the elderly over 85. In conclusion, the expansion of LTCHs seems to contribute to decrease in the inpatient cost of the elderly in ACHs and to increase efficiency in the utilization of health resources.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.199-210
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• 2017

Background: This paper aims to demonstrate current health expenditure (CHE) and National Health Accounts of the years 2015 constructed according to the SHA2011, which is a new manual of System of Health Accounts (SHA) that was published jointly by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Eurostat, and World Health Organization in 2011. Comparison is made with international trends by collecting and analysing health accounts of OECD member countries. Particularly, financing public-private mix is parsed in depth using SHA data of both HF as financing schemes as well as FS (financing source) as their revenue types. Methods: Data sources such as Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service's publications of both motor insurance and drugs are newly used to construct the 2015 National Health Accounts. In the case of private financing, an estimation of total expenditures for revenues by provider groups is made from the Economic Census data; and the household income and expenditure survey, Korean healthcare panel study, etc. are used to allocate those totals into functional classifications. Results: CHE was 115.2 trillion won in 2015, which accounts for 7.4 percent of Korea's gross domestic product. It was a big increase of 9.3 trillion won, 8.8 percent, from the previous year. Government and compulsory schemes's share (or public share) of 56.4% of the CHE in 2015 was much lower than the OECD average of 72.6%. 'Transfers from government domestic revenue' share of total revenue of HF was 17.8% in Korea, lower than the other contribution-based countries. When it comes to 'compulsory contributory health financing schemes,' 'Transfers from government domestic revenue' share of 14.9% was again much lower compared to Japan (44.7%) and Belgium (34.8%) as contribution-based countries. Conclusion: Considering relatively lower public financing share in the inpatient care as well as overall low public financing share of total CHE, priorities in health insurance coverage need to be repositioned among inpatient care, outpatient care and drugs.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.282-292
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• 2022

Background: Aging societies face social problems of increased medical expenses for older adults due to increased geriatric diseases. This study aims to analyze the relationship between the state change of multiple chronic conditions (MCC) and out-of-pocket medical expenses in the elderly aged 60 or older. Methods: The 2014-2018 Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging data were used for 2,202 elderly people. Four status change groups were established according to the change in the number of chronic diseases. The association between the change of MCC and the out-of-pocket medical cost was analyzed using the generalized estimating equation model analysis. Results: The average out-of-pocket total medical costs were 1,384,900 won for participants with MCC and 542,700 won for those without MCC, which was a statistically significant difference (p<0.0001). Compared to the reference group (simple chronic disease, SCD→SCD), the change in multiple chronic conditions significantly increased the total out-of-pocket medical expenses in MCC→MCC and SCD→MCC groups (MCC→MCC: 𝛽=0.8260, p<0.0001; SCD→MCC: 𝛽=0.6607, p<0.0001). Conclusion: In this study, it was confirmed that the prevalence of MCC increased with age, and the out-of-pocket medical cost increased in the case of MCC. Continuity of treatment can be achieved for patients with MCC, and the system and management of treatment for MCC are required to receive appropriate treatment.