About Me
I am a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Stanford King Center. In July 2026 I will join the Economics Department at Boston University as an Assistant Professor.
My research and teaching interests are development economics, industrial organization, and healthcare economics.
You can find my CV here.
Working Papers
Who calls the shots? Financial incentives and provider influence in the adoption of a new health technology (Job Market Paper)
Abstract
The choice to adopt an effective healthcare product is often a joint decision between the patient and their medical professional. Many governments and payers use patient subsidies and provider incentives to increase the adoption of new health technologies. Using data from a randomized field experiment in Kenya, I estimate a structural model of patient demand and provider advice for a new contraceptive method. I then use the model to study the welfare effects to the patient from the introduction of demand and supply side incentives to adopt the new technology. This approach allows the study of channels that promote diffusion, including the roles of provider advice, financial incentives and altruism, as well as patient preferences. Taken together, the results suggest that changes in provider advice due to their altruism and financial incentives are key to increasing adoption of the new technology and making incentive programs effective, regardless of whether the incentive targets the patient or the provider. In fact, changes in provider advice account for 79% of the welfare benefits of a policy that reduces the price to the patient. To be effective, incentive policies need to account for the central role that the provider takes in medical decision-making.Using Diagnosis Contingent Incentive Contracts to Improve Malaria Treatment (current draft)
With Maria Dieci, Paul Gertler, and Jonathan Kolstad
Abstract
We examine a novel diagnosis contingent incentive contract designed to improve the treatment of malaria. The contract provides incentives to use rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) to diagnose patient malaria status combined with incentives to treat with antimalarial drugs (ACTs) if the patient tests positive but not if they test negative. Using data from a cluster randomized field experiment with 140 pharmacies in Kenya, we find that both patient subsidies and provider incentives significantly increased RDT testing uptake and reduced the purchase of unnecesary ACTs by those whose test negative. Patient incentives operate through lower prices, whereas provider incentives work through providers giving better information and advice. Using a model of patient choice, we estimate that diagnosis-contingent contracts increase social welfare substantially relative to program costs, where the primary gain in welfare comes from a reduction in the use of ACTs from patients who test negative and therefore do not need treatment. Finally, we use the experiment to estimate a structural model that allows us to explore counterfactual contract designs. We find that the biggest welfare gains per unit of program cost come from contracts that load all of the incentives in reducing the price of treatment contingent on testing positive for malaria due to biased patient beliefs. The optimal contract delivers 4 times the welfare gains of a policy that simply offers free testing while keeping expected costs to the planner below the retail price of tests.Publications
Targeting Impact versus Deprivation (American Economic Review)
With Johannes Haushofer, Edward Miguel, Michael Walker and Paul Niehaus
Abstract
A large literature has examined how best to target anti-poverty programs to those most deprived in some sense (e.g., consumption). We examine the potential tradeoff between this objective and targeting those most impacted by such programs. We work in the context of an NGO cash transfer program in Kenya, employing recent advances in machine learning methods and dynamic outcome data to learn proxy means tests that jointly target both objectives. Targeting solely on the basis of deprivation is not attractive in this setting under standard social welfare criteria unless the planner’s preferences are extremely redistributive.Works in progress
Demand for generic medications and unobserved product quality in Mexico
With Adrian Rubli
Optimal incentive contracts for malaria case-management
With Maria Dieci, Paul Gertler, and Jonathan Kolstad