Do physicians' financial incentives influence health care supply, technology diffusion, and resulting patient outcomes? In 1997, Medicare consolidated the geographic regions across which it adjusts payments for physician services, leading to area-specific price shocks that are plausibly exogenous with respect to health care demand. Areas with higher payment shocks experienced significant increases in health care supply. On average, a 2 percent increase in payment rates leads to a 5 percent increase in care provision per patient. Elective procedures such as cataract surgery respond twice as strongly as less discretionary services like dialysis. Higher reimbursements increase the pace of technological diffusion, as non-radiologists acquire magnetic resonance imaging scanners sooner when prices increase. The incremental care has no significant impacts on mortality, hospitalizations, or myocardial infarctions (heart attacks).
Urban Economics
Can Cheap Credit Explain the Housing Boom? (with Edward L. Glaeser and Joseph Gyourko), National Bureau of Economic Research Working Papers (2010)
Between 1996 and 2006, real housing prices rose by 53 percent according to the Federal...
The Wealth of Cities: Agglomeration Economies and Spatial Equilibrium in the United States (with Edward L. Glaeser), Journal of Economic Literature (2009)
Empirical research on cities starts with a spatial equilibrium condition: workers and firms are assumed...
The Economics of Place-Making Policies (with Edward L. Glaeser), Brookings Papers on Economic Activity (2008)
Should the national government undertake policies aimed at strengthening the economies of particular localities or...
Urban Resurgence and the Consumer City (with Edward L. Glaeser), Urban Studies (2006)
Cities make it easier for humans to interact, and one of the main advantages of...
Health and Medicine
Hypoxia, Not the Frequency of Sleep Apnea, Induces Acute Hemodynamic Stress in Patients With Chronic Heart Failure (with Alan R. Schwartz, Joanne Marshall, Pamela Ouyang, Linda Kern, Veena Shetty, Maria Trois, Naresh M. Punjabi, Cynthia Brown, Samer S. Najjar, and Stephen S. Gottlieb) (2009)
Objectives: This study was conducted to evaluate whether brain (B-type) natriuretic peptide (BNP) changes during...
Hypoxia, Not the Frequency of Sleep Apnea, Causes Acute Hemodynamic Stress in Patients with Congestive Heart Failure (with Alan R. Schwartz, Samer S. Najjar, and Stephen S. Gottlieb), Journal of Cardiac Failure (2009)
Hypoxia appears to be an important factor that underlies the impact of sleep abnormalities on...
Real Estate
Can Cheap Credit Explain the Housing Boom? (with Edward L. Glaeser and Joseph Gyourko), National Bureau of Economic Research Working Papers (2010)
Between 1996 and 2006, real housing prices rose by 53 percent according to the Federal...
Behavioral Finance
Can Cheap Credit Explain the Housing Boom? (with Edward L. Glaeser and Joseph Gyourko), National Bureau of Economic Research Working Papers (2010)
Between 1996 and 2006, real housing prices rose by 53 percent according to the Federal...