Provision of Hospital Charity Care in the United States

The goal of this project is to understand the trends of charity care over time, identify the characteristics of hospitals providing different levels of charity care, and explain the variation in the levels of charity care across hospitals. The project will entail a retrospective analysis of archival administrative data, including Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Cost Reports and IRS Form 990, which both include self-reported charity care data. The analysis will look at trends in charity care provision from 2009 through 2018 (data release permitting) at the individual, state, and national level; by hospital characteristics, such as ownership and hospital type; and applicable state policies, such as Medicaid expansion and charity care reporting requirements.