We present a simple graphical framework to illustrate the potential welfare gains from a "top-up" health insurance policy requiring patients to pay the incremental price for more expensive treatment options. We apply this framework to breast cancer treatments, where lumpectomy with radiation...

We examine the effects of employment-contingent health insurance on married women's labor supply following a health shock. First, we develop a theoretical model that examines the effects of employment-contingent health insurance on the labor supply response to a health shock, to clarify under...

In 1971 President Nixon declared war on cancer and increased the federal funds allocated to cancer research dramatically. Thirty years later, many have declared this war a failure. Overall cancer statistics confirm this view: age-adjusted mortality in 2000 was essentially unchanged from the...

Only about one third of the approximately 80 drugs currently used to treat cancer had been approved when the war on cancer was declared in 1971. We assess the contribution of pharmaceutical innovation to the increase in cancer survival rates in a differences in differences' framework, by...

Current mammography guidelines reflect evidence that mammography could be harmful on average through the overdiagnosis of breast cancers that would not eventually cause symptoms in the long term. To inform targeting within these guidelines, I investigate whether some women are more likely to...

I investigate whether the types of cancer (breast, colon, lung, etc.) subject to greater penetration of new ideas had larger subsequent survival gains and mortality reductions, controlling for changing incidence. I use the MEDLINE/PubMED database, which contains more than 23 million references...

Immunization can cause moral hazard by reducing the cost of risky behaviors. In this study, we examine the effect of HPV vaccination for cervical cancer on participation in the Pap test, which is a diagnostic screening test to detect potentially precancerous and cancerous process. It is strongly...

The premature cancer mortality rate has been declining in Canada, but there has been considerable variation in the rate of decline across cancer sites. I analyze the effect that pharmaceutical innovation had on premature cancer mortality in Canada during the period 2000-2011, by investigating...

Local opinion leaders may play a key role in easing information frictions associated with technology adoption. This paper analyzes the influence of physician investigators who lead clinical trials for new cancer drugs. By comparing diffusion patterns across 21 new cancer drugs, we separate...

Drugs like bevacizumab ($50,000 per treatment episode) and ipilimumab ($120,000 per episode) have fueled the perception that the launch prices of anticancer drugs are increasing over time. Using an original dataset of 58 anticancer drugs approved between 1995 and 2013, we find that launch...