The share of health-care spending in GDP has been rising rapidly in the United States and other advanced industrial countries since at least 1960. As Jones (2005) and others have argued, the rapid increase in the price of medical care likely is demand-driven to a large degree, reflecting the...

How the current medical malpractice crisis affects the Ninth District.

This analysis of outpatient medical expenditures for children identifies which children experience a relative decline in medical expenditures between 1977 and 1987. The paper also evaluates some standard methodologies used in medical demand estimation. Our semiparametic approach models...

In evaluating health-care plans, economists look for the not-so-obvious costs, such as those related to adverse side effects, patients' lost productivity and even volunteers' time.

A look at some of the reasons behind the ascent in health care costs over the last few decades and an analysis of how government policy has both contributed to and tried to rein in these costs.