Because the health sector makes up a large share of the U.S. economy, widespread price changes for medical services can impact overall inflation significantly. Cuts to public health-care spending spill over directly and indirectly to private spending. A recent estimate suggests the full effect...

We investigate whether physicians' financial incentives influence health care supply, technology diffusion, and resulting patient outcomes. In 1997, Medicare consolidated the geographic regions across which it adjusts physician payments, generating area-specific price shocks. Areas with higher...

We measure the importance of increasing returns to scale and trade in medical services. Using Medicare claims data, we document that "imported" medical care -- services produced by a medical provider in a different region -- constitute about one-fifth of US healthcare consumption. Larger regions...

We study how short-term labor markets responded to an extraordinary demand shock during the COVID-19 pandemic. We study traveling nurse jobs—a market hospitals use to fill temporary staffing needs—to examine workers’ willingness to move to places with larger demand shocks. We find a...

Proposals to create a national health care plan such as “Medicare for All” rely heavily on reducing the prices that insurers pay for health care. These changes affect physicians’ short-run incentives for care provision and may also change health care providers’ incentives to invest in...