This paper explores the effects of public health insurance expansions on hospitals' decisions to adopt medical technology. Specifically, we test whether the expansion of Medicaid eligibility for pregnant women during the 1980s and 1990s affects hospitals' decisions to adopt neonatal intensive...

This paper revisits the relationship between nurse staffing and quality of care in nursing homes using an instrumental variables approach. Most prior studies rely on cross-sectional evidence, which renders causal inference problematic and policy recommendations inappropriate. We exploit...

This paper provides a formal model of the trial selection process that incorporates the Priest-Klein hypothesis and alternative theories of selection. We derive the conditions under which the hypothesis is valid, and examine implications for the relationship between trial outcome uncertainty and...

This article estimates the impact of minimum staffing requirements on the nursing home market using a unique national panel over the 1996-2005 period. This study reveals that, given a half-hour increase in the minimum nursing hours per resident day for licensed nurses, quality of patient care...

Using nationwide county-level longitudinal data, we show that recent declines in housing prices are associated with an increased utilization of antidepressant prescriptions among the near elderly. Our results persist in difference-in-difference models using either all non-antidepressant drugs or...

We examine the impact of U.S. states’ adoption of the partnership long-term care (LTC) insurance program on households’ purchases of private coverage. Targeting middle-class households, this program increases the benefits of privately insuring via a higher asset threshold for Medicaid...

This paper modifies the optimal penalty analysis by incorporating investment incentives with external benefits. In the models examined, the recommendation that the optimal penalty should internalize the marginal social harm is no longer valid as a general rule. We focus on antitrust...

We present a new model of negligence and causation and examine the influence of the negligence test, in the presence of intervening causation, on the level of care. In this model, the injurer's decision to take care reduces the likelihood of an accident only in the event that some...

With contributions from some of the leading scholars in law and economics, this comprehensive book summarizes the state of economic research on litigation, procedure and evidence.

This paper revisits the relationship between nurse staffing and quality of care in nursing homes using an instrumental variables approach. Most prior studies rely on cross-sectional evidence, which renders causal inference problematic and policy recommendations inappropriate. We exploit...