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When policy makers look for solutions to extend health coverage to uninsured individuals, the challenge is to direct government subsidies as efficiently as possible to minimize "crowding out," or displacing, current coverage contributions that are already being made. Crowd-out has not been a significant concern when extending public coverage to more children. Instead, the expansion of public health programs, through Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) —called Medi-Cal and Healthy Families in California, respectively—has protected children against this erosion in employer-based coverage. Public expansions have led to more children getting access to needed health care—care they were not getting or couldn’t afford under employer-based coverage.
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