This paper studies the effects of oil rent on development using a unique panel dataset describing worldwide oil discoveries and extractions. First, we revisit the so-called curse of oil, which contends that oil rent hinders economic development. Exploiting cross-country variations in the timing...

Previous literature indicates that non-economic damages caps increase the number of physicians but finds no significant effect on health. A potential explanation is that, by reducing the cost of malpractice, caps affect physicians’ incentives to provide high quality care, an important...

This paper investigates the impact of the regulation prohibiting physicians from prescribing drugs without a prior physical examination on health outcomes. This requirement should improve health by reducing illegal access to prescription drugs. On the other hand, it hampers the practice of...

More progressive taxes, holding tax liability constant, generate disincentives for health investment by decreasing benefits for additional working time and, thus, decreasing returns to health. On the other hand, progressive taxation may induce individuals to invest more in health for the purpose...