Job Market Paper: "The Economics of Choosing Traditional Medicine: Theory and Evidence from India"
Abstract: Why do patients reject clinically superior treatments, even when they are accessible and affordable? This phenomenon is particularly acute in India, where half of urban households rely on traditional practitioners for chronic conditions such as hypertension, despite modern medicine being more effective and cheaper. I conduct a randomized controlled trial with 1,819 adults at high risk of hypertension who primarily use traditional medicine. I randomly vary only the institutional sources of clinical evidence about modern medicine's efficacy. I find three main results: (i) the messenger matters more than the message—attributing evidence to India's traditional medicine authority (AYUSH) increases modern medicine spending and take-up rates, while attribution to international medical journals has modest, insignificant effects; (ii) patients can simultaneously adopt superior treatments while experiencing smaller decreases in trust in traditional institutions when information comes from trusted sources; and (iii) effects fade within two months without reinforcement, revealing that sustained behavior change requires repeated engagement rather than one-time messaging. The results demonstrate that institutional credibility is a first-order determinant of healthcare decision-making, with implications for any domain where multiple authorities compete for legitimacy.
Other Research Papers
"Quality Provision with Decision Frictions: Evidence from the Indian Pharmaceutical Sector"
Abstract: How do decision frictions from brand preference variation affect firms' quality provision incentives in emerging markets? I study this question in India's pharmaceutical sector, where firms are globally competitive yet face substantial brand preference variation domestically across therapeutic categories. Using novel data linking domestic drug sales and U.S. FDA quality approvals for 876,546 observations between 2010-2020, I find that small firms experience statistically significant positive effects from FDA certification, while large firms show negative but insignificant effects. The results reveal that brand preference variation limits firms' ability to build reputation locally, with international certification providing meaningful benefits primarily for smaller firms. This pattern indicates that decision frictions create differential incentives for quality investment, with international certification serving as an effective pathway for smaller firms to overcome domestic market barriers.
The Persistent Spillover Effects of Political Movement on Social Attitudes: Evidence from China's Sent-down Youth Movement
I investigate the persistent spillover effects of China's sent-down youth movement on social belief formation. Combining province-level data on sent-down youth numbers with the China Family Panel Studies survey, I exploit a difference-in-differences strategy using both regional and cohort variations. Results demonstrate that individuals in provinces with higher movement intensity who were born into more exposed cohorts are significantly more likely to believe that hard work, intellect, and capacity are rewarded in today's society. These findings reveal the persistent and positive effects of the sent-down youth movement on citizens' social attitudes toward meritocracy.
Work in Progress
Healthcare Decision-Making:
Health Information Acquisition and Patient Learning: Evidence from Personalized Online Search
Provider Competition and Diffusion of Medical Knowledge: Evidence from China (with Chirantan Chatterjee, Matthew Higgins)
Market Structure and Innovation:
Production Outsourcing and The Direction of Global Pharmaceutical Innovation (with Chuqiao Nan)
Competition and Innovation during the Industrial Revolution: Evidence from France (with Lukas Rosenberger, Christopher Sims)
Competition and Input Oligopsony along the Value Chain: Evidence from the Peruvian Alpaca Industry