PUBPOL 6410

Health Economics I

Course Description

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2023-2024.

This course teaches the economic approach to studying risky health behaviors such as cigarette smoking, drug use, alcohol abuse, risky sex, and poor diet and physical inactivity (leading to obesity), and suicide. We will examine in detail the research literature on the demand for health, economic models of addiction, the economic causes and correlates of risky health behaviors (e.g. education, prices, peers), and policies for modifying risky behaviors (e.g. taxes and other financial incentives, and providing information).

When Offered Spring.

Prerequisites/Corequisites Prerequisite: Ph.D. level courses in microeconomic theory and econometrics.

Comments This is the first in Cornell's two course sequence in Ph.D.-level Health Economics. 

• Convey to you information about the most up-to-date studies, methods and findings from economic research on risky health behaviors
• Help you transition from being a consumer of research to a producer of research
• Improve your communication skills (both written and oral).

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