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April 17, 2024
Quarterly Opinion
Jennifer Karas Montez
Sep 25, 2024
Jul 31, 2024
Jul 22, 2024
Back to The Milbank Quarterly Opinion
The impact of US state policies on population health is increasingly evident.1 States’ earned income tax credits, cigarette sales taxes, right to work laws, Medicaid expansion, firearm safety, and paid family leave are just a few examples of specific policies that affect population health. Better understanding these effects has become urgent as states continually grow farther apart on both their policies and their population’s health. Although research has started to connect the dots between the divergence in states’ policies and their populations’ health,2,3 it has become clear that better understanding the connections requires new approaches and greater attention to certain issues. I offer here 10 ways to accelerate research on the role that the seismic shifts in states’ policy contexts may have played in the troubling trends and growing disparities in Americans’ health. The list is informed by years of collaborative research on the role of state policy contexts on population health, thoughtful questions from academic and nonacademic audiences following presentations of that research, and insightful critiques from journal reviewers.
In conclusion, emerging research points to a potential role of state policy contexts in the alarming trends and growing disparities in population health in the United States.2,3 Doing this type of research is challenging, particularly given data limitations and the vast number of state policies that exist, have changed over time, and have become correlated. Advancing this research could benefit by considering these 10 suggestions. Although no single study is expected to incorporate all 10 suggestions, the field at large could benefit by systematically incorporating them into future research.
Jennifer Karas Montez is a professor of sociology, the Gerald B. Cramer Faculty Scholar in Aging Studies, director of the NIA-funded Center for Aging and Policy Studies, and codirector of the Policy, Place, and Population Health Lab at Syracuse University. Her research investigates trends and disparities in population health since the 1980s and the growing influence of US state policies and politics on those outcomes. A major focus of her work is explaining why health trends are particularly worrisome for women, for people without a college degree, and for those living in states in the South and Midwest. Her research on these topics has been featured in outlets such as the New York Times, BBC, NPR, and CNN. It has been funded by the National Institute on Aging, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Carnegie Corporation, and National Science Foundation. Montez received her PhD in Sociology from the University of Texas at Austin.