The extent of pharmaceutical advertising and promotion can be characterized by a balancing act between profitable demand expansions and potentially unfavorable subsequent regulatory actions. However, this balance also depends on the nature of competition (e.g. monopoly versus oligopoly). In this...

What does economics have to say about the design of international trade agreements? We review a literature on this question, providing detailed coverage on three key design features of the GATT/WTO: reciprocity, nondiscrimination as embodied in the MFN principle, and tariff bindings and binding...

We establish four facts concerning competition among U.S. generic drug suppliers, using IQVIA's National Sales PerspectiveTM 2004Q4 – 2016Q3 data. We define a unique product market (“molform”), consisting of the combination of a molecule active ingredient and a route of administration...

Economic literature has extensively studied how prices for incumbent pharmaceutical drugs respond to generic competition after entry. However, less attention has been paid to pricing behavior in anticipation of brand-to-brand competition. We contribute to this gap in the literature by both...

Drug pricing in the U.S. is a persistently vexing policy problem. While there is agreement among many policy analysts that supra competitive prices are necessary to promote innovation; significant disagreements arise over how much pricing discretion prescription drug manufacturers should be...

This paper studies how patent rights and price regulation affect how fast new drugs are launched in different countries, using newly constructed data on launches of 642 new drugs in 76 countries for the period 1983-2002, and information on the duration and content of patent and price control...

Does drug treatment for depression with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) increase or decrease the risk of completed suicide? The question is important in part because of recent government warnings that question the safety of SSRIs, one of the most widely prescribed medications in...

Recent outbreaks of infectious pathogens such as Zika, Ebola, and COVID-19 have underscored the need for the dependable availability of vaccines against emerging infectious diseases (EIDs). The cost and risk of R&D programs and uniquely unpredictable demand for EID vaccines have discouraged...

This study examines the effect of price regulation and competition on launch timing and pricing of new drugs. Our data cover launch experience in 15 countries for drugs in 12 therapeutic classes that experienced significant innovation over the decade 1992-2003. We use prices of established...