In this study we provide evidence that historical migration flows impact present-day global health differences. The underlying theory is based on three physiological facts. First, vitamin D deficiency is directly associated with increased risk of premature death. Second, the ability of humans to...

In many health care systems payers reward physicians for reaching predetermined performance targets. These targets may be based on measures for which own performance is difficult to predict. This paper uses a principal-agent model to analyse physicians' response to a target-based performance...

Earlier studies of health inequality across European countries have shown intriguing results, in particular with respect to retirement status as one of the determinants of health inequality. A priori, one would expect that inequality in health and income would be associated. Theory suggests that...

In duration analysis, the Mixed Proportional Hazard model is the most common choice among practitioners for the specification of the underlying hazard rate. One major drawback of this model is that the value of the frailty term (i.e. unobserved factors) is time-invariant. This paper introduces a...

This study seeks to investigate whether elicited preferences are affected by the presentation of mortality risks in a stated preference survey. A three-way split sample discrete choice experiment was conducted in which respondents were asked to express their willingness-to-pay for public risk...

Alike most of the Western world, the Danish fertility rate declined throughout the 20th century simultaneous to economic growth. This development, which conflicts with economic intuition, has been denoted the fertility paradox, and several studies have been devoted to resolve it. The present...

All five Nordic countries emphasise equal and easy access to healthcare. It is the purpose to explore to which extent the populations of these countries have reached good health and high degree of socio-economic equality of health. Each of the five countries has established extensive public...

Pregnancy conditions have been shown to matter for later economic success, but many threats to fetal development that have been identified are difficult to prevent. In this paper I study seasonal influenza, a preventable illness that comes around every year and causes strong inflammatory...

This paper examines public valuations of mortality risk reductions. We set up a theoretical framework that allows for altruistic preferences, and subsequently test theoretical predictions through the design of a discrete choice experiment. By varying the tax scenario (uniform versus individual...

Denmark implemented a major reform of the administrative and political structure in 2007 when the previous 13 counties were merged into five new regions and the number of municipalities was reduced from 271 to 98. A main objective was to create administrative units that were large enough to...