Economics 156/256 –Economics of Health
and Medical Care
Syllabus
Fall 2004
Professor: Jay Bhattacharya
Office Phone: (650) 736-0404
e-mail: jay@stanford.edu
website:
<http://courseworks.stanford.edu>
Meeting Times: MW 9-10:50am
Meeting Place: LaneHall 203 (AKA 200-203)
Office: Encina Commons, Room
186
Office Hours: Monday
11:30am-1:15pm, or by appointment
Course Summary
This course is an
introduction to the field of health economics.
Health economics is an active field of microeconomics with a large and
growing literature. In the past decade,
some of the most controversial policies considered by state and federal
governments have involved issues that have been analyzed by health economists. This class will provide an introduction to
the health care system in the
Prerequisites
Students should have a firm
grasp of microeconomics at the level of Intermediate Microeconomics. Students should also be comfortable with
basic concepts in statistics. Much of the literature in health economics requires
that readers be conversant in the language of statistics and econometrics, so
we will review these as necessary.
Grading
The grade will be based on a
midterm (30%) and a final (40%). In
addition, there will be four problem sets that will count toward the grade in the
class (30%). Performance on the
examinations will no doubt be affected by the students’ understanding of the
material on the problem sets. Problem
sets will be due by 5pm in mailbox assigned to this course in the economics
department.
The material covered on the
examinations will come from the lecture notes, problem sets and required
reading. If a student requests that some
question on an examination be re-graded, I will review the entire examination. There will be no make-up final, so please
plan ahead. This course will adhere to
the rules described in the Economics Department Common Syllabus:
(http://www-econ.stanford.edu/academics/economics_department_course_management.pdf).
Reading Assignments
The text for the course is The
Economics of Health and Health Care, 4th Edition by Folland,
Goodman, and Stano (FGS). All required
and recommended readings will be available at the courseworks website for the
class at http://courseworks.stanford.edu.