Elon Musk and DOGE's legacy.

I’m thrilled to share that BU Questrom is launching a PhD program in Business Economics, in collaboration with BU’s Department of Economics. Our goal is to prepare students to do high-impact research setting them up for academic careers. Read a Q&A here: practicingeconomist.com/boston-unive...

I’m thrilled to share that BU Questrom is launching a PhD program in Business Economics, in collaboration with BU’s Department of Economics. Our goal is to prepare students to do high-impact research setting them up for academic careers. Read a Q&A here: practicingeconomist.com/boston-unive...

Catastrophic coverage is "really designed for someone who has access to a large amount of financial assets or credit, and could cover about $9,000 in healthcare spending as an individual or $18,000 as a family" -Keith Ericson www.newsweek.com/health-cover...

Suggests anything that the FTC has done without Slaughter can be challenged as invalid and without legal authority. Good scope for some creative attorneys…

Nearly all PhDs take 5 years--with finishing in 4 a rare outcome. This is deliberately designed to eliminate the international powerhouse that is US postgraduate training.

Here’s the link to comment on the rule. Please do comment. They can make a difference in litigation. www.federalregister.gov/documents/20...

I am honored to be appointed to the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission. I look forward to helping our Commonwealth get better healthcare at lower cost. @masshpc.bsky.social #mapoli #HealthPolicy @buquestrom.bsky.social insights.bu.edu/professor-ke...

Full resignation letter from Demetre C. Daskalakis, a CDC leader, does not hold back. "The recent shooting at CDC is not why I am resigning. My grandfather, who I am named after, stood up to fascist forces in Greece and lost his life doing so. I am resigning to make him and his legacy proud."

"The A.I. companies selected to oversee the program would have a strong financial incentive to deny claims. Medicare plans to pay them a share of the savings generated from rejections." www.nytimes.com/2025/08/28/h...

This imagery is the kind of thing you see in video games to let you know you’re in a totalitarian city or country.

Glad to see @aoc.bsky.social drawing attention to this. bsky.app/profile/aoc....

Please, join a protest for democracy this Saturday, June 14th. America deserves better and can be better. www.nokings.org

Reducing Administrative Barriers Increases Take-Up of Subsidized Health Insurance Coverage: Evidence from a Field Experiment url:https://direct.mit.edu/rest/article-abstract/doi/10.1162/rest_a_01573/128264/Reducing-Administrative-Barriers-Increases-Take-Up

Summary, video, and ungated paper: practicingeconomist.com/2024/01/25/w...

www.forbes.com/sites/brucej... Aetna is out of the ACA in 2026

🚨 Rethinking Moral Hazard: Moral hazard in health insurance—the increased spending that comes when you get insured—is usually seen as wasteful due to insurance’s price distortion. This paper challenges that view.

I am proud of economist and Stanford President Jonathan Levin for speaking out in defense of liberty. Let's see more universities follow suit! "Harvard’s objections... are rooted in the American tradition of liberty, a tradition essential to our country’s universities, and worth defending".

Reducing administrative burdens helps people access support. If the govt already knows the answer to the question, why make you fill it out? www.nber.org/papers/w30885

Imagine not realizing who looks bad in this scenario

With liquidity constraints, moral hazard can be welfare-enhancing. Revisiting the Oregon Health Insurance Experiment finds Medicaid is twice as valuable if living hand-to-mouth, from Keith Marzilli Ericson, Johannes G. Jaspersen, and Justin R. Sydnor https://www.nber.org/papers/w33648

From time to time I read a paper so clear and full of insight that I know immediately it will change the way I see a topic. This is one of them.

I'm very much looking forward to reading this and incorporating it into my teaching. Income effects and liquidity constraints helps clarify the Nyman (1999) insight about the welfare effects of financing "unaffordable" health care. And there are simple graphs!

🚨 Rethinking Moral Hazard: Moral hazard in health insurance—the increased spending that comes when you get insured—is usually seen as wasteful due to insurance’s price distortion. This paper challenges that view.

Dr. Feyman is a talented health policy researcher with an impressive track record. I'm confident whatever institution hires him next will be better for it. scholar.google.com/citations?us...

"Evil is unspectacular and always human, And shares our bed and eats at our own table."-- W.H. Auden

My public comment opposing the proposed changes eliminating the X gender marker on passports. practicingeconomist.wordpress.com/wp-content/u...

"Two oligarchs control most of the social media. A few others control most of the major newspapers, from the Washington Post to the Wall Street Journal, from the Los Angeles Times to the Minnesota Star-Tribune."

Another NIH dementia grant cancelled because it involves trans people. I’m struck by the words “Privileged, confidential, pre-decisional”. When I worked for the fed gov’t we put that at the top of *draft* materials so they were not subject to FOIA. Why is NIH terminating grants with this language?

These are enormous mortality effects: "four years after the HIV testing in 2004, HIV-positive individuals who learned their status were 18 percentage points less likely to have survived compared to HIV-positive individuals who did not learn their status."

As federal research grants continue to be frozen, and NIH staff is being gutted, please note this study was funded by federal research grants, including from NIH. If they continue with staff cuts, and continue to freeze new awards, this is just one example of what we lose.

Why Dean Karlan, Chief Economist of USAID resigned yesterday: "I was ready to rebuild from wherever we ended up to identify the most effective programs, figure out how to get them back in place, and to recommend new awards. But I received no response. Zero engagement." www.npr.org/sections/goa...

"The conqueror is always a lover of peace; he would like to make his entry into our state unopposed" -- Carl von Clausewitz

Come teach at Boston University! We're hiring for a Full-Time Lecturer, in Questrom's Markets, Public Policy and Law Department. We're looking for some who can teach one or more of: microeconomics, macroeconomics, and/or econometrics with Python. academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/29674

Come teach at Boston University! We're hiring for a Full-Time Lecturer, in Questrom's Markets, Public Policy and Law Department. We're looking for some who can teach one or more of: microeconomics, macroeconomics, and/or econometrics with Python. academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/29674

The Wayback machine has it, not sure if the data sets will download correctly web.archive.org/web/20250119...

"Evil is unspectacular and always human, And shares our bed and eats at our own table."-- W.H. Auden

We are so privileged to have leaders to remind us of our values and inspire us. MLK Day is one of the most meaningful holidays our country has because he still challenges us to do better and act more boldly.

"a loose cannon for peace" what a phrase! www.bostonglobe.com/2024/12/29/m...

Macroeconomists cautiously proposing the idea that... problems that Fields medalists can occasionally handle *(in special cases) are perhaps not the best as-if models of agents' dynamic behavior

This is one of the more insane stories I've read in healthcare recently. I was literally gasping every few paragraphs. (PS -- If you are looking for a good organization to donate, you can't go too wrong with ProPublica)