关键词: 医疗保险 , 收入差异 , 就业率

Abstract: paper studies the impacts of public health insurance on labor force participation and incomeThe theoretical model decomposes the total effect of a change in the health service charge into a substitution effect and a wealth effectThe two effects take the opposite signsWhen the substitution effect is greater than the wealth effect，an individual prefers to substitute health care with leisure time by participating more in the labor force to increase income and then to purchase better health insuranceWe use the data from China to test the theoretical findingsEmpirical results illustrate that the substitution effect in China is greater than the wealth effectA possible reason is that the public health insurance system in China dictates barriers across different insurance schemes according to household registration types or occupationsIndividuals are not able to move freely between different insurance schemes through participating in the labor forces or increasing labor supply

Key words: health insurance , income gap , labor force participation