Policymaking, Trust, and the Demand for Public Services: Evidence from a Mass Sterilization Campaign

By Gianmarco León-Ciliotta ⓡ Dijana Zejcirovic ⓡ Fernando Fernandez

American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, February 2025

We study a large-scale family planning intervention in which more than 260,000 Peruvian women were sterilized. Many of these medical procedures are alleged to have been performed without patient consent. The subsequent disclosure of alleged illegal steril...

Maritime emissions and infant health

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Do stricter regulations improve health outcomes for newborns?

US health insurance, the Nobel prize, and cashless payment systems

[News]

February 04, 2025

Reading recommendations from Timothy Taylor, managing editor of the Journal of Economic Perspectives"

ASSA 2015 Webcast: The Undismal Science

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The Undismal Science Presiding: Richard Thaler Tackling Tempation Katherine L. Milkman Design and Effectiveness of Public Health Subsidies in Poor Countries Pascaline Dupas Racial Inequality in the 21st Century: The Declining Signficance of Discrimination Roland Fryer The Micro of Macro Amir Sufi

Promotions and Productivity: The Role of Meritocracy and Pay Progression in the Public Sector

By Erika Deserranno, Philipp Kastrau, and Gianmarco León-Ciliotta

American Economic Review: Insights, March 2025

We study promotion incentives in the public sector. In collaboration with Sierra Leone's Ministry of Health, we introduce exogenous variation in the meritocratic nature of promotions from health worker to supervisor positions and in health workers' percep...

Surviving Bad News: Health Information without Treatment Options

By Alberto Ciancio, Fabrice Kämpfen, Hans-Peter Kohler, and Rebecca Thornton

American Economic Review: Insights, March 2025

When there is no treatment available for a life-threatening disease, providing personal health information could lead to despair or fatalistic behaviors resulting in negative health outcomes. We document this possibility utilizing an experiment in Malawi ...

Prisons and mental health

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Norway’s rehabilitation-oriented correctional system is a case study for improving the mental health outcomes for the incarcerated.

America’s public safety net

[Research Highlight]

March 18, 2025

Christopher Howard discusses the history of public assistance and social insurance in the United States.

The Productivity Consequences of Pollution-Induced Migration in China

By Gaurav Khanna, Wenquan Liang, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, and Ran Song

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, April 2025

We quantify how pollution affects aggregate productivity and welfare in spatial equilibrium. We show that skilled workers in China emigrate away from polluted cities. These patterns are evident under various empirical specifications, such as when instrume...

Family Spillover Effects of Marginal Diagnoses: The Case of ADHD

By Petra Persson, Xinyao Qiu, and Maya Rossin-Slater

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, April 2025

The health care system uses patient family medical history in many settings, and this practice is widely believed to improve the efficiency of health care allocation. This paper provides a counterpoint by documenting that reliance on hereditary informatio...

Do Ordeals Work for Selection Markets? Evidence from Health Insurance Auto-Enrollment

By Mark Shepard and Myles Wagner

American Economic Review, March 2025

Are application hassles, or "ordeals," an effective way to limit public program enrollment? We provide new evidence by studying (removal of) an auto-enrollment policy for health insurance, adding an extra step to enroll. This minor ordeal has a major impa...

Hassle costs and take-up

[Research Highlight]

April 01, 2025

Is paperwork an effective way to limit public program enrollment?

Reexamining air quality regulations

[Research Highlight]

April 15, 2025

Lutz Sager and Gregor Singer discuss the Clean Air Act and how to estimate its impact on air quality.

Public and Private Provision of Information in Market-Based Public Programs: Evidence from Advertising in Health Insurance Marketplaces

By Naoki Aizawa and You Suk Kim

American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, May 2025

This paper studies government and private advertising in market-based public programs. In a model of advertising, we first examine when government advertising increases welfare. Then, we estimate the effects of advertising on consumer demand and assess th...

Physician Group Influences on Treatment Intensity and Health: Evidence from Physician Switchers

By Joseph J. Doyle and Becky Staiger

American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, May 2025

Treatment intensity varies remarkably across physicians, and physicians are increasingly working in groups. This paper tests whether group affiliation impacts physicians' treatment intensity and patient health. Using Medicare inpatient claims data, we foc...

Presidential Address: Investing in Children to Address the Child Mental Health Crisis

By Janet Currie

American Economic Review, May 2025

The child mental health crisis has been described as the "defining public health crisis of our time." This article addresses three myths about the crisis: (i) the idea that the crisis is new; (ii) the belief that increases in youth suicide mainly reflect ...

When Do "Nudges" Increase Welfare?

By Hunt Allcott, Daniel Cohen, William Morrison, and Dmitry Taubinsky

American Economic Review, May 2025

We use public finance sufficient statistic approaches to characterize the welfare effects of "nudges," such as simplified information and warning labels, in markets with taxes and endogenous prices. While many studies focus on average effects, we show tha...

How Do Mental Health Treatment Delays Impact Long-Term Mortality?

By Sydney Costantini

American Economic Review, May 2025

With a growing mental health crisis and a shortage of behavioral health specialists, those seeking mental health treatment often face long wait times to obtain care. I study how clinic congestion affects mortality for veterans experiencing mental health e...

Rebuilding careers

[Research Highlight]

May 27, 2025

Higher education can help injured workers transition to higher-paying occupations.

The Broad Decline in Health and Human Capital of Americans Born after 1947

By Nicholas Reynolds

American Economic Review: Insights, June 2025

I present evidence of across-cohort decline in the health and human capital of Americans, beginning with those born after 1947 and continuing until those born in the mid-1960s. Education, men's wages, women's maternal health (proxied by their infants' bir...