We provide new cross-country evidence on smoking persistence in Europe, which can be due to both true state dependence … methods, applied to both the smoking participation and the cigarette consumption decision, which we allow to be correlated. We … find that for both smoking decisions true state dependence is generally much smaller, but still important, when unobserved …

We present a generalized solution to Grossman’s model of health capital (1972), relaxing the widely used assumption … that individuals can adjust their health stock instantaneously to an “optimal” level without adjustment costs. The Grossman … model then predicts the existence of a health threshold above which individuals do not demand medical care. Our generalized …

We use life satisfaction and Body Mass Index (BMI) information from three waves of the GSOEP to test for social … interactions in BMI between spouses. Social interactions require that the cross-partial effect of partner's weight and own weight … the correlation between satisfaction and own BMI is initially positive, but turns negative after some threshold …

that improvements in infant health help explain secular increases in cognitive test scores, that better cognition may link … early life health to adulthood earnings, and that human capital investments through childhood and young adulthood respond …

Research in the health sciences reports persistent racial differences in health care access, utilization, and outcomes … medication therapies and the patients’ adherence to those medical recommendations. Equalizing access to quality health care will … in health outcomes. …

experiment of assigned college roommates to estimate peer effects for several measures of health risks: binge drinking, smoking … that peer effects for smoking may be positive among men and negative among women. In contrast to prior research, the peer …

Predicting health care utilization is the foundation of many health economics analyses, such as calculating risk …-adjustment capitation payments or measuring equity in health care utilization. The most common econometric models of physician utilization …