Labor Studies.

• Position: Program and Working Group Meetings

The NBER's Program on Labor Studies met in Cambridge on March 7. Program Director Richard B. Freeman and NBER Research Associate Lawrence E. Katz, both of Harvard University, organized the meeting. These papers were discussed:

Amitabh Chandra, Harvard University and NBER, and Douglas O. Staiger, Dartmouth College and NBER, "Identifying Provider Prejudice in Healthcare"

Patricia Cortes, University of Chicago, and Jose Tessada, MIT, "Cheap Maids and Nannies: How Low-Skilled Immigration is Changing the Labor Supply of High-Skilled American Women"

Jennifer Hunt, McGill University and NBER, "How Much Does Immigration Boost Innovation?"

Sumit Agarwal, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago; John C. Driscoll, Federal Reserve Board; Xavier Gabaix, New York University and NBER; and David Laibson, Harvard University and NBER, "The Age of Reason: Financial Decisions over the Life Cycle"

Jeffrey R. Kling, Brookings Institution and NBER; Sendhil Mullainathan, Harvard University and NBER; Eldar Shafir, MIT; Lee Vermeulen, University of Wisconsin; and Marian V. Wrobel, Harvard University, "How We Choose: Medicare Drug Plan Selection"

Eric D. Gould, Hebrew University; Victor Lavy, Hebrew University and NBER; and M. Daniele Paserman, Boston University and NBER, "Sixty Years after the Magic Carpet Ride: The Long-Run Effect of the Early Childhood Environment on Social and Economic Outcomes"

There are large racial and gender disparities in healthcare that are not explained by differences in patient access, preferences, or severity. These disparities are believed to contribute to differences in health outcomes, and often are ascribed to prejudicial providers. To evaluate this theory, Chandra and Staiger use simple economic insights to distinguish between two competing views of physician behavior, each with very different policy implications. If prejudicial, providers use a higher benefit threshold before providing care to minority groups; these patients should therefore have higher returns from being treated. Under statistical-discrimination, race and gender are statistically related to the benefit from treatment. Using data on heart-attack treatments, the researchers find no evidence of prejudicial behavior against women or minorities by providers. They also evaluate alternative explanations for differences in the treatment of women and minorities, such as different triage rules, different implicit values of life, different treatment objectives, greater clinical...