Decisions concerning environmental protection hinge on estimates of economic burden. Over the past 30 years, economists have developed and applied various tools to measure this burden. In this paper, developed as a chapter for the Handbook of Environmental Economics, we present a taxonomy of...

Health improvements in India, while significant, have not kept up with rapid economic growth rates. The poor in India face high out-of-pocket payments for health care, a significant burden of infectious diseases, and a rapidly increasing burden of non-communicable diseases. Against this...

In response to the challenge of sustaining the health gains achieved in the better-performing states and ensuring that the lagging states catch up with the rest of the country, the Indian government has launched the National Rural Health Mission. A central goal of the effort is to increase...

The animal husbandry industry is a major emitter of methane, which is an important greenhouse gas. The industry is also a major emitter of ammonia, which is a precursor of fine particulate matter—arguably, the number-one environment-related public health threat facing the nation. We present an...

We investigate the relationship between obesity and life expectancy, and whether or not this relationship varies by socioeconomic status (SES). The underlying model is based on the "Pathways to health" framework in which SES affects health by modifying the relationship between lifestyles and...

Geographic variation in healthcare utilization has raised concerns of possible inefficiencies in healthcare supply, as differences are often not reflected in health outcomes. Using comprehensive Norwegian microdata, we exploit cross-region migration to analyze regional variation in healthcare...

The recognition that environmental hazards can affect children differently and more severely than adults has provoked growing concern in industrialized nations about the impact of environmental pollution on children’s health. In this paper, commissioned by the OECD, we are charged with...

The focus of the present study is on consumer health information in relation to supplier induced demand (SID). We argue that a comparison between medical professionals and nonmedical professionals fails to identify demand inducement. Using a new information measure based on questions of the...

Health care markets often lack a market force because the presence of health insurance undermines price signals. Patients have little incentive to shop for low-priced alternatives because they do not bear the full cost of their health care consumption. In turn, producers lack incentives to...

On the basis of the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement (SHARE), we analyse the determinants of who engages in mammography screening focusing on European women aged 50-69 years. A special emphasis is put on the measurement error of subjective life expectancy and on the measurement and...