I am using the variable VERIFY for the years between 2009 and 2018.
According to the documentation, the categories are
0: NIU
1: No, uninsured
2: Yes, insured
However, the variable is actually coded binary (0/1).
Is the following reading correct?
0: No, uninsured
1: Yes, insured.
Thanks for clarifying!
VERIFY reports whether someone who previously replied “no” to having (in the previous calendar year) any of the types of health insurance asked about in their CPS interview says that they indeed had health insurance coverage. The majority of people are not in the universe (NIU) for VERIFY since they will have reported having had some type of health insurance coverage in the previous calendar year. These NIU persons are assigned a code of 0, having already confirmed health insurance coverage. Respondents who fit the universe for VERIFY are either coded as not having any coverage (VERIFY = 1) or as having coverage (VERIFY = 2). Note that from 2014 on, VERIFY does not contain any “Yes” responses in the original data.
This variable has three distinct codes that should be considered in analyses of health care coverage. For analyses that do not include any years prior to 2001, researchers may group NIU cases with “Yes” responses to VERIFY in order to identify all persons who had health care coverage. However when comparing estimates with data prior to 2001, users should treat persons coded as “Yes” in the VERIFY variable as uninsured in order to increase comparability. Alternatively, users can analyze the summary health insurance variables instead, which contain imputed verification information for the 1988-2000 period (see HCOVANY).
Many thanks @Ivan_Strahof for explaining this!
I would suggest adding a version of your statement to the documentation: “Note that from 2014 on, VERIFY does not contain any “Yes” responses in the original data.”
This was not clear to me after reading the documentation. (And you can only see this change in the code breakdown tab if you select years before and after 2014.)