Yale launches new program to serve as a hub for policy-relevant health economics research

Over the past two decades, U.S. health care spending has nearly doubled in real terms, from $2.5 trillion in 2000 to $4.9 trillion in 2023. Today health care costs account for nearly one-fifth of the U.S. economy.

Put simply, the U.S. spends a lot of money on health care, but it doesn’t always have a lot to show for it, with millions of individuals and families often lacking access to affordable, high-quality health care and services, and poor health outcomes relative to other wealthy countries.

Reducing health care costs while improving health and ensuring access to quality care will require tailored, evidence-based solutions. To help policymakers tackle these complex challenges, Yale University has launched the Tobin-Cowles Health Economics & Policy Program, co-directed by Professors Janet Currie and Zack Cooper, to catalyze rigorous academic economic scholarship at Yale that directly informs policymakers and the public on key areas of health policy.

“Health care is one of the most important sectors of the U.S. economy, but too often, the connection between rigorous academic research and the policymaking process is weak.”

— Zack Cooper, Associate Professor of Economics and Public Health

The program is jointly supported by the Tobin Center for Economic Policy and the Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics—two of Yale’s leading institutions for empirical, policy-relevant economics research.

Yale is home to many of the nation’s leading experts on a wide range of topics in health policy, from issues that affect public health insurance programs like Medicaid and Medicare to those that affect the privately insured, and those that affect all Americans such as rising health care costs and social determinants of health. Yale faculty publish influential research on everything from how hospital mergers drive up prices to the effects of work requirements on SNAP beneficiaries to research on interventions and programs to reduce rates of mental illness in children.

“This initiative will harness synergies across the university so that more of that research can help improve people’s lives.”

— Janet Currie, the David Swenson Professor of Economics

The new program will pool this vast expertise in order to inspire and facilitate academic scholarship that is relevant to today’s health policy challenges.

“Health care is one of the most important sectors of the U.S. economy, but too often, the connection between rigorous academic research and the policymaking process is weak,” said Zack Cooper, Associate Professor of Economics and Public Health. “We want to strengthen that link—by building community among Yale’s health economists, supporting new research that is policy relevant, helping scholars access data, and ensuring their findings reach policymakers and improve the lives of the public.”

By connecting economists with policymakers and health care leaders, the program aims to shed new light on the economic forces shaping American health—and to translate that research into evidence-based policy.

“Yale already has a remarkable depth of expertise in health economics, including in key areas including public and private health insurance, health behaviors, mental health policy, and more,” said Janet Currie, the David Swenson Professor of Economics. “This initiative will harness synergies across the university so that more of that research can help improve people’s lives.”