Dr. Cohen Presents Two Economics Papers and Elected President of ASSA TPUG

 

Jeffrey P. Cohen, associate professor of economics, Barney School of Business, was a panelist and presented his research on drug abuse treatment costs in a roundtable meeting at the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that was held in Bethesda, Md., Dec. 13-14, 2007.

He outlined techniques for determining whether it would be cost effective for hospitals to provide both inpatient and outpatient drug abuse treatment, or only one of these services. Also, he discussed how these techniques can be helpful to hospitals and other clinic-based treatment facilities in deciding whether to expand or contract their scale of operation. These approaches have been largely ignored in research on drug abuse treatment costs, but have the potential for aiding policy makers in solving problems that could help greater numbers of patients receive much needed treatment.

Cohen also presented a research paper (co-authored with Kristen Monaco) titled "Inter-county Spillovers and Ports and Roads Infrastructure Investment" at the 2008 Allied Social Sciences Association (ASSA) Annual Meetings, in New Orleans, La., on Jan. 5. The paper assesses the benefits to firms in California counties of proximity to ports in the state. Among the findings are that firms' production in counties with large ports is lower as a result of increases in neighboring counties' ports infrastructure—in other words, the neighboring counties end up drawing away the most productive resources. On the other hand, some counties with smaller ports experience enhanced productivity from additional neighboring counties' ports infrastructure, due to the greater ease of shipping goods.

During the 2008 ASSA Annual Meetings, Cohen was inducted as the president of the Transportation and Public Utilities Group of the ASSA. The ASSA is the national association for economists.