Kate Ho

Last updated
Kate Ho
Born
Katherine Ho
CitizenshipAmerican
Academic background
Alma mater Cambridge University, Harvard University
Academic work
Discipline Economics
Sub-discipline Health Economics, Industrial Organization
Institutions Princeton University

Kate Ho is an economics professor at Princeton University. Since July 2018, Professor Ho has worked in partnership with Janet Currie, as a co-director of Princeton's Center for Health and Wellbeing. [1] Ho specializes in the medical care market and its industrial organization [1] with an emphasis on health insurers and hospitals. [1] Ho studies how price effects and the conditions of care provided by hospitals. [1] She has received several awards for her academic research. Professor Ho is a frequent keynote speaker at conferences across the United States of America.

Contents

Education

Kate Ho obtained a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) and Master of Arts (M.A.) in Mathematics from Cambridge University in June 1993. [2] She then proceeded to attend Harvard University where she acquired a Master of Economics (A.M.) in 2003, and a Ph.D. in Business Economics in 2005. [2]

Career

Before formally starting her career in academics, Kate served as a Chief of Staff to the Minister of State for Health, for the UK Government Department of Health from 1993 to 1997. [3] Following this position, she became a Junior Associate for McKinsey & Company, Inc, from 1997 to 1999. [2] Professor Ho joined Columbia University's Department of Economics as an assistant professor from 2005 to 2009. [2] Succeeding this position, Ho became an associate professor at this same institution. [2] Kate has also spent time at Northwestern University in 2008 as a visiting associate professor in their Center for the Study of Industrial Organization, and at Yale University in 2009, as a visiting faculty member with the Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics. [2] She also taught as a visiting associate professor at Wharton's School of the University of Pennsylvania in the fall of 2014, in their department of Business Economics and Public Policy. [2] Currently, she instructs at Princeton University as a Professor of Economics, while maintaining her role as co-director for Princeton's Center for Health and Wellbeing. [4]

In addition, Kate Ho is affiliated with the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), where she has worked as a research fellow, since 2013. [3] Furthermore, she also holds a co-editor position at the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy. [3] In the past, Kate has also been an editorial board member for the American Economic Review, the American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, and the Journal of Economic Literature. [3]

Selected scholarship

"The Evolution of Health Insurer Costs in Massachusetts, 2010-12" (2018)

In collaboration with Ariel Pakes, and Mark Shepard, Kate Ho and her colleagues, investigate the state of Massachusetts from 2010-2012 in relation to its costs of health insurance, targeting the progression of its enrollees. [5] Their focus on Massachusetts, is a result of their immense range of medical prices amongst their hospitals. [5] More specifically, it is noted that several hospitals were paid around twice the amount for a procedure, compared to others in the state. [5] They gathered their information from the Massachusetts All-Payer Claims Database (APCD) as a way of visualizing the progression of costs for healthcare during this time period. [5] This time span was chosen as Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) made the decision to incentivize their physicians with control of costs, while Preferred Provider Organizations (PPOs), opted out of doing so. [5] They stress the importance of recognizing two components before having a proper impression of the cost growth; “Consumers switching between plans, and differences in costs characteristics between new entrants and those leaving the market.” [5] They mention that during this span, global payment usage, “non-fee-for-service” payments, nearly doubled in this state. [5] These global payments are designed to divide associated risks with providers to promote a reduction in costs. [5] Through use of a risk-adjusted decomposition of the enrollees cost growth, they find that HMOs have a more gradual cost increase than PMOs which may be due to individuals with better health levels transitioning from PMOs to HMOs. [5] Alternatively, individuals with declining health rates will move from an HMO to a PMO. [5] They connect the idea that these tactics used by HMOs, led to healthier individuals using them instead of PMOs. [5] Hence, the researchers state that this creates further incentives to endorse these global payments. [5]

"The Business Case for Diabetes Disease Management for Managed Care Organizations" (2006)

In conjunction with Nancy Beaulieu, David M. Cutler, George Isham, Tammie Lindquist, Andrew Nelson and Patrick O’Connor, Kate Ho and associates, explore diabetes disease management. They recognize that diabetes diagnosis’ are frequently occurring and rather expensive, and that 40 percent of those living with it, are unable to attain proper medical care management. [6] With assistance from a Minnesota health care program, HealthPartners, the team uses their data to investigate the business case. [6] The researchers attempt to find an answer to whether or not diabetes disease management programs are worth the investment. [6] They state that health plans that implement a disease management program for individuals with diabetes are subjected to higher premiums and can increase their medical care savings. [6] They are able to pinpoint certain aspects that can impede the business case for health plans; adverse selection, contracting, turnovers and network externalities. [6] In specific, contracting difficulties, means that individuals with diabetes will have to absorb more insurance costs and this payment process proves to be difficult. [6] Overall, they find feasible evidence that health plans can obtain economic benefits from developing better diabetes management care. [6] A more important find is that individuals living with the disease will have an increase in the quality of their lives, if healthcare management plans choose to better themselves. [6]

"Insurer-Provider Networks in the Medical Care Market" (2005)

In this work, Ho aims to discover the origins and welfare effects of hospital networks. [7] She recognizes that there is a lack of research in regard to restrictions implemented by insurance agencies in hospital networks that allow their consumers to have a freedom of choice. [7] With the use of data from care plans in 43 US markets, she reveals that markets that have a minimal amount of hospitals and insurance providers, with a significant amount of possible contracts, fail to come to a concise agreement. [7] When hospitals form alliances, referred to as “systems”, they impact the degree to which insurance companies and hospitals can bargain. [7] When this occurs, it is revealed through her analysis that these systems have a tendency to seize 19 per cent markups, as opposed to hospitals that do not enter into systems, as they claim zero markups. [7] Furthermore, she notes that hospitals who have high expectations that their beds will be occupied, may actually be incentivized to invest less in regard to their capacity. [7] Her research provides evidence that more hospital beds would positively affect consumers with $330,000 in benefits for each bed, which would still exceed the profits produced by the hospitals and insurers. [7] Therefore, hospitals that are constrained by their capacity, are not incentivized to invest, due to this process of bargaining, amounting to less benefits for the consumers. [7] Ultimately, an important outcome of these results, is that it highlights the ideal bargaining models that can be used for price negotiation in relation to hospital-health plans. [7]

"The Welfare Effects of Restricted Hospital Choice in the US Medical Care Market" (2005)

Published in 2005, Ho performed research to analyze the effect on welfare, when health insurers restrain their consumers' ability to choose a hospital in a network, where they would then be treated. [8] The network that has been chosen ultimately impacts consumer welfare, the design of new technology, the amount of profit captured by the hospitals, and whether or not the hospital will decide to invest in expanding capacity. [8] By obtaining data from 43 US healthcare plan markets, Kate executes a three-step econometric model. [8] This is devised in order to forecast enrollee's demand for a healthcare plan, based on the hospital networks that they will have access to. [8] Her results do in fact show that when in the process of deciding a healthcare plan, consumers substantially and positively value the expected utility from the potential network of hospitals. [8] Furthermore, with the usage of a welfare analysis, Ho finds that these selective networks actually cause an annual one billion dollar societal loss in these markets. [8]

Other research

Awards and recognition

In 2006, Ho received the Richard Stone Prize in Applied Econometrics for her academic paper, "The Welfare Effects of Restricted Hospital Choice in the US Medical Care Market". [9] She was chosen as the recipient for the Arrow Award for Best Paper of the Year in 2010, due to paper, “Insurer-Provider Networks in the Medical Care Market.” [10] Her most recent recognition of achievement has been the Paul Geroski Award for Best Paper of the Year in 2012 for her work on, “Location and Competition in Retail Banking.” [11] In 2019, Ho was announced as a fellow of the Econometric Society. [12] Kate Ho and Robin Lee won the 2020 Frisch Medal Award for their paper "Insurer Competition in Health Care Markets” [13]

Speaking engagements

Related Research Articles

In the United States, a health maintenance organization (HMO) is a medical insurance group that provides health services for a fixed annual fee. It is an organization that provides or arranges managed care for health insurance, self-funded health care benefit plans, individuals, and other entities, acting as a liaison with health care providers on a prepaid basis. The Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973 required employers with 25 or more employees to offer federally certified HMO options if the employer offers traditional healthcare options. Unlike traditional indemnity insurance, an HMO covers care rendered by those doctors and other professionals who have agreed by contract to treat patients in accordance with the HMO's guidelines and restrictions in exchange for a steady stream of customers. HMOs cover emergency care regardless of the health care provider's contracted status.

Health economics

Health economics is a branch of economics concerned with issues related to efficiency, effectiveness, value and behavior in the production and consumption of health and healthcare. Health economics is important in determining how to improve health outcomes and lifestyle patterns through interactions between individuals, healthcare providers and clinical settings. In broad terms, health economists study the functioning of healthcare systems and health-affecting behaviors such as smoking, diabetes, and obesity.

Mark McClellan

Mark Barr McClellan is the director of the Robert J Margolis Center for Health Policy and the Margolis Professor of Business, Medicine and Health Policy at Duke University. Formerly, he was a senior fellow and director of the Health Care Innovation and Value Initiative at the Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform at The Brookings Institution, in Washington, D.C. McClellan served as commissioner of the United States Food and Drug Administration under President George W. Bush from 2002 through 2004, and subsequently as administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services from 2004 through 2006.

The term managed care or managed healthcare is used in the United States to describe a group of activities intended to reduce the cost of providing for-profit health care and providing American health insurance while improving the quality of that care. It has become the essentially exclusive system of delivering and receiving American health care since its implementation in the early 1980s, and has been largely unaffected by the Affordable Care Act of 2010.

...intended to reduce unnecessary health care costs through a variety of mechanisms, including: economic incentives for physicians and patients to select less costly forms of care; programs for reviewing the medical necessity of specific services; increased beneficiary cost sharing; controls on inpatient admissions and lengths of stay; the establishment of cost-sharing incentives for outpatient surgery; selective contracting with health care providers; and the intensive management of high-cost health care cases. The programs may be provided in a variety of settings, such as Health Maintenance Organizations and Preferred Provider Organizations.

In health insurance in the United States, a preferred provider organization (PPO), sometimes referred to as a participating provider organization or preferred provider option, is a managed care organization of medical doctors, hospitals, and other health care providers who have agreed with an insurer or a third-party administrator to provide health care at reduced rates to the top insurer's or administrator's clients.

Maccabi Healthcare Services

Maccabi Health Services, known as Kupat Holim Maccabi, is one of the four Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) currently active in Israel. It was founded in September 1940 and began operating in August 1941. Since 1995 Maccabi has been operating under the National Health Insurance Law. Membership fees for HMOs in Israel are legally determined and are collected from those entitled to membership by the Institute for National Insurance.

Angus Deaton British microeconomist

Sir Angus Stewart Deaton is a British-American economist and academic. Deaton is currently a Senior Scholar and the Dwight D. Eisenhower Professor of Economics and International Affairs Emeritus at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs and the Economics Department at Princeton University. His research focuses primarily on poverty, inequality, health, wellbeing, and economic development.

Healthcare in the Netherlands

Healthcare in the Netherlands can be divided in several ways: firstly in three different echelons; secondly in somatic versus mental healthcare; and thirdly in "cure" versus "care". Home doctors form the largest part of the first echelon. Being referred by a first echelon professional is frequently required for access to treatment by the second and third echelons, or at least to qualify for insurance coverage for that treatment. The Dutch health care system is quite effective in comparison to other western countries but is not the most cost-effective. Costs are said to be high because of over-use of in-patient care, institutionalised psychiatric care and elderly care.

Health insurance in the United States is any program that helps pay for medical expenses, whether through privately purchased insurance, social insurance, or a social welfare program funded by the government. Synonyms for this usage include "health coverage", "health care coverage", and "health benefits". In a more technical sense, the term "health insurance" is used to describe any form of insurance providing protection against the costs of medical services. This usage includes both private insurance programs and social insurance programs such as Medicare, which pools resources and spreads the financial risk associated with major medical expenses across the entire population to protect everyone, as well as social welfare programs like Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program, which both provide assistance to people who cannot afford health coverage.

An integrated delivery system (IDS), also known as integrated delivery network (IDN), is a health system with a goal of logical integration of the delivery (provision) of health care as opposed to a fragmented system or a disorganized lack of system.

Anne Osborn Krueger American economist

Anne Osborn Krueger is an American economist. She was the World Bank Chief Economist from 1982 to 1986, and the first deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) from 2001 to 2006. She is currently the senior research professor of international economics at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, D.C. She also is a senior fellow of Center for International Development and the Herald L. and Caroline Ritch Emeritus Professor of Sciences and Humanities' Economics Department at Stanford University.

Nyman's model was developed by John A. Nyman beginning in 1999 and presents an alternative view of moral hazard in the context of private health insurance in the United States. Nyman is a professor of Economics at the University of Minnesota.

Amy Nadya Finkelstein is a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the co-director and research associate of the Public Economics Program at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and the co-Scientific Director of J-PAL North America. She was awarded the 2012 John Bates Clark Medal for her contributions to economics. She was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and won a MacArthur "Genius" fellowship in 2018.

Janet Currie is a Canadian-American economist and the Henry Putnam Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University's School of Public and International Affairs, where she is Co-Director of the Center for Health and Wellbeing. She served as the Chair of the Department of Economics at Princeton from 2014–2018. She also served as the first female Chair of the Department of Economics at Columbia University from 2006–2009. Before Columbia, she taught at the University of California, Los Angeles and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She was named one of the top 10 women in economics by the World Economic Forum in July 2015. She was recognized for her mentorship of younger economists with the Carolyn Shaw Bell award from the American Economics Association in 2015.

Ariél Stanley Pakes is the Thomas Professor of Economics at Harvard University. He specializes in econometrics and industrial organization.

Trevon D'Marcus Logan is the Hazel C. Youngberg Trustees Distinguished Professor in the Department of Economics and Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at The Ohio State University, where he was awarded the 2014 Alumni Award for Distinguished Teaching. He is also a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. In 2014, he was the youngest-ever president of the National Economic Association. In 2019, he was the inaugural North Hall Economics Professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. In 2020, he was named the inaugural director of the National Bureau of Economic Research Working Group on Race and Stratification in the Economy. His research mainly focuses on economic history, including studies of African American migration, economic analysis of illegal markets, the economics of marriage transfers, and measures of historical living standards, with an emphasis on racial disparities in the United States.

Tufts Health Plan is a Massachusetts-based health insurance company under Tufts Associated Health Plans, Inc. with headquarters in Watertown, Massachusetts.

Robert A. Pollak is an economist. Pollak has made contributions to the specification and estimation of consumer demand systems, social choice theory, the theory of the cost of living index, and since the early 1980s, to the economics of the family and to demography. He is currently the Hernreich Distinguished Professor of Economics at Washington University in St Louis, holding joint appointments in the Faculty of Arts & Sciences and in the Olin Business School.

Kathleen M. McGarry is a Professor of Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles and a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research. She is also a co-investigator of the Health and Retirement Survey. From 2007 to 2009, she was Joel Z. and Susan Hyatt ‘72 Professor in the Department of Economics at Dartmouth College. She has served on the Editorial Boards of the American Economic Journal: Public Policy, the American Journal of Health Economics, and the Journal of Pension Economics.

Petra Persson is a Swedish economist and Assistant Professor in Economics at Stanford University. Persson is best known for her work in Public and Labour Economics where her research focuses on the interactions between family decisions and the policy environment. Specifically, Persson's research agenda is centered on studying government policy, family wellbeing, and informal institutions.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "CHW Welcomes Kate Ho as New Center Co-Director | Center for Health and Wellbeing". chw.princeton.edu. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Kate Ho Curriculum Vitae" (PDF). Retrieved 22 November 2019.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "Kate Ho". scholar.princeton.edu. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  4. "Kate Ho | HCEO". hceconomics.uchicago.edu. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Ho, Kate; Pakes, Ariel; Shepard, Mark (2016). "The Evolution of Health Insurer Costs in Massachusetts, 2010-12". National Bureau of Economic Research. Cambridge, MA. doi: 10.3386/w22835 . PMID   30034091.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Beaulieu, N.; Cutler, D.M.; Ho, K.; Isham, G.; Lindquist, T.; Nelson, A.; O'Connor, P. (2006). "The Business Case for Diabetes Disease Management for Managed Care Organizations". Forum for Health Economics & Policy. 9. doi:10.2202/1558-9544.1072. S2CID   15359478.
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Ho, Katherine. (2005). "Insurer-Provider Networks in the Medical Care Market" (PDF). The American Economic Review. National Bureau of Economic Research. 99 (1): 393–430. doi:10.1257/aer.99.1.393. OCLC   1027372885. PMID   29504738. S2CID   3664024.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Ho, Katherine (2005). The Welfare Effects of Restricted Hospital Choice in the US Medical Care Market. National Bureau of Economic Research. OCLC   874283060.
  9. Ho, Katherine. "Katherine Ho". VoxEU.org. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  10. "Arrow Award - International Health Economics Association". www.healtheconomics.org. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  11. "Past Winners". Elsevier.
  12. "The Society Announces its 2019 Fellows | The Econometric Society". www.econometricsociety.org. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  13. "Awards | The Econometric Society". www.econometricsociety.org. Retrieved 2020-09-18.
  14. "Industrial Organization Society". web.northeastern.edu. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  15. "Industrial Organization". Stanford Graduate School of Business. Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  16. "2019 Plenaries & Special Events – ASHEcon" . Retrieved 2019-11-25.
  17. Washington, Constitution Center 400 7th St SW; States, DC 20024 United (2015-03-27). "Eighth Annual Federal Trade Commission Microeconomics Conference". Federal Trade Commission. Retrieved 2019-11-25.