Wealthier Areas of U.S. Experience Largest Rise in Uninsured Rates

As President Obama’s administration and Congress tackle the challenging task of health care reform, an examination of the number of uninsured people in Patchwork Nation communities reveals that the areas hardest hit between 2000 and 2005 were the wealthier Monied Burbs and Boom Towns.

“When you really look at it more closely, those Monied Burbs, we tend to think of those as very wealthy places with a lot of executives and white-collar workers, but there are manufacturing jobs there, too. And of course, from 2000 to 2005, there were a lot of cuts in those areas, and cuts in jobs in those places means cuts in insurance,” said Dante Chinni, Patchwork Nation’s project director.

In Patchwork Nation’s Boom Towns, many of the illegal immigrants who worked construction jobs did not have health insurance, Chinni said.

Listen to Chinni’s full interview

The U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration’s most recent county-level uninsured data is from 2005.

Reforming health care may be one of the trickiest issues for President Obama’s administration to tackle. In most of the communities Chinni has tracked, it remains the issue that pleases no one.

“Nobody really wants anything done. It’s the one issue where people come at it from different sides. They have different concerns but the ultimate answer is: ‘I’m really worried about that.’ Even if it’s not a really good system, they just don’t want it touched.”