EcoEchoes

Episode 24: Michael Haylock and Nudging Donors: Behavioural Insights from a Stem Cell Registry

This episode's guest is Michael Haylock, a health economist now working in consulting after a postdoc at the University of Duisburg-Essen. He presents his paper “Improving the availability of stem cell donors,  a letter and email intervention” which looks at the effects of a behavioural intervention to reduce attrition among registered donors. We talk about the importance and logistics of stem cell donation, how commitment nudges can help identify more reliable donors, and the challenges of working with large registries. Michael also discusses a second paper on pro-social workplace behaviour, showing how leadership and personality shape helping cultures. The working paper is titled "Helping in the Workplace: The Role of Leadership and Employee Personality and Preferences". The episode ends with reflections on PhD life advice and transitioning to consultancy. 
Guest: Michael Haylock, Health Economist at bcmed GmbHHosts: Fanny Tallgren & Prithviraj Basu MallikDisclaimer: The views expressed are Michael’s own and do not represent those of his current or previous institutions.
Timestamps:
(00:23) Introduction to Michael Haylock and his research background
(03:56) What is the bone marrow registry and why stem cell donation matters
(08:29) How the donor–patient matching and international coordination works
(13:16) High attrition rates among registered donors and behavioural intervention design
(18:03) Summary of key findings: commitment nudges and donor reliability
(30:13) Second paper: helping behaviour in the workplace and leadership roles
(36:00) Trust, altruism, and personality as drivers of workplace cooperation
(43:39) Transitioning from academia to consulting: motivation and differences
(51:00) Productivity advice for PhD students and research workflow tips

Episode 23: Benjamin Chibuye on the role of physician altruism in opioid prescribing

This episode’s guest is Benjamin Chibuye, a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Danish Centre for Health Economics (DaCHE) in Department of Public Health at the University of Southern Denmark. He presents his working paper on physician altruism and opioid prescribing, focusing on how Danish general practitioners respond to national guidelines in light of their professional motivations. The conversation explores the complexities of health provider behaviour, the role of public service motivation, and the broader policy implications for addressing opioid overuse.
Guest: Benjamin Chibuye, Postdoctoral Researcher, Danish Centre for Health Economics, University of Southern Denmark
Hosts: Fanny Tallgren & Andrea De Palma
Timestamps:
(01:05) Benjamin’s academic journey and research interests in development and health economics
(06:08) Study overview: physician altruism, opioid guidelines, and the double agency problem
(14:16) Measuring altruism through survey data and linking it to prescribing behaviour
(20:00) Analytical strategy: using registry data and a difference-in-differences design
(27:25) Why physician heterogeneity matters for health policy effectiveness
(32:57) Reflections on the supply side of the opioid crisis and advice for early-career researchers
 

Conference Review 5: Economic Science Association (ESA) Europe meeting in Helsinki

This one is for the experimental economists. Fanny shares her experience attending the Economic Science Association’s European Meeting in Helsinki in September 2024. This was Fanny's first experience attending a non-health conference. Listen to find out why the conference is worth attending if you run experiments. The next European meeting will take place in Brno, Czech Republic from Wednesday 3 September until Saturday 6 September 2025. Find out more about the conference by clicking this link. Deadline for submitting an abstract is 5th May. 
Also, this episode was recorded back in October 2024, which is before we had a proper studio. Therefore, this episode has rougher audio than in our latest episodes. Thanks for your patience with the sound quality!
Timestamps:
(0:00) Why try an "econ” conference & what the ESA actually does(2:00) Keynote #1 – Ingvil Almas(4:30) Keynote #2 – Douglas Bernheim(9:20) Keynote #3 – Leonardo Bursztyn (12:00) Special sessions: How to scale experiments with John List and Abhijeet Singh, The importance of reproducibility of experiments, How to get tenure(18:10) The range of experiments presented (Field, lab and online)(21:00) Conference culture—walking tours, beer tasting, reindeer-spotting & Sunday-9 a.m. presentations(24:00) Main take-aways

Conference Review 4: Alzheimer Europe

In this episode we introduce our co-host Dyllis De Pessemier. She briefly introduces herself and shares her experience attending the 34th Alzheimer Europe Conference in Geneva. She presented her first project there, titled "The effect of a person with dementia's permanent nursing home admission on their partner's mental well-being". We also talk about our experiences attending conferences alone. 
The next Alzheimer Europe conference will be from 6th to 8th October 2025 in Bologna, Italy. Abstract submission closes 30th April 2025! Link to the conference is here.
 

Episode 22: Benoit Decerf and the trade-off between poverty and longevity

This episode's guest is Benoit Decerf, a Senior Economist in the Development Research Group of the World Bank, presenting his paper named "Attitudes on the trade-off between poverty and longevity". The discussion explores how mortality can be integrated into poverty measurement, the methodology used to estimate people's willingness to trade income for additional years of life, and the implications of these findings for policy and economic modeling. Benoit also shares insights into working at the World Bank compared to academia and provides advice for those interested in research roles at international institutions.
Guest: Benoit Decerf, Senior Economist in the Development Research Group of the World Bank
Hosts: Fanny Tallgren & Andrea De Palma
Disclaimer: The discussion from this podcast episode reflects Benoit's views, not those of the World Bank.
Timestamps: 
(01:19) Objectives and overview of Benoit's research
(05:54) Methodology for estimating the trade-off between poverty and mortality
(16:56) Key findings and cross-country comparisons
(32:55) Implications of the study and future research
(35:43) Working at the World Bank and tips for young researchers

Conference Review 3 - Lucerne courses

In our third conference review episode, Prithvi discusses with Fanny his experience attending two courses in Lucerne, Switzerland by the Swiss Society of Health Economics: one on Empirical Policy Evaluation and another on Machine Learning. The discussion covers expectations, course content, key takeaways, and practical applications of the methods learned.
You can find the link to the Lucerne website here.

Episode 21: Alexander Marin and the Dynamics of Out-of-Pocket Health Expenditures

We got the chance to record an episode with Alexander Marin and to talk about his working paper "The Heterogeneous Risk and Dynamics of Out-of-Pocket Health Expenditures" where he uses machine learning (multivariate random forest) and time series models (ARMA) to analyse healthcare expenditure trends in the US. We talk about how health care spending and the persistence of elevated spending following a health shock varies across different demographic groups, such as age, income, insurance status, and health conditions. We also briefly touch on the challenges of writing papers which are methodological contributions, and the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration. Lastly, Alexander shares a bit about his ongoing research related to the future of healthcare funding in ageing societies.
Guest: Alexander Marin, Postdoc at the University of Southern Denmark in the Interdisciplinary Centre on Population Dynamics
Hosts: Fanny Tallgren & Andrea De Palma
Timestamps: 
(01:49) Start of discussion of paper
(08:58) Methods used in the paper
(27:42) Results of the paper
(35:55) Alexander's work at the Interdisciplinary Centre on Population Dynamics
 

Conference Review 2 - NHESG2024 / Nordic Health Economists’ Study Group meeting

In the second conference review, Fanny talks to Prithvi about her experience at the Nordic Health Economists’ Study Group meeting which took place in August 2024 at the University of Eastern Finland in Kuopio, Finland. 
You can find the link to the 2024 NHESG website here.
If you would like to apply for NHESG conference at University of Oslo coming up in August 2025, you can do so using this link. Abstract submission deadline is Monday, April 14, 2025. 

Episode 20: Amitabh Chandra and the productivity of scientists

We had the pleasure to record an episode with Amitabh Chandra. We discuss his working paper "Productivity Differences in Fundamental Life-Sciences Discovery" co-authored with Connie Xu. The aim of the paper is to research whether a life scientist's university has an effect on their productivity. To answer this question, they first attempt to measure a scientist's productivity, and then use a movers design to estimate the causal effect of the university on productivity. We end the episode with a conversation about what makes a research idea worth pursuing as well as the purpose and art of presentations.  
Guest: Amitabh Chandra (Professor at Harvard) 
Hosts: Prithviraj Basumallik and Fanny Tallgren  
Timestamps:
(4:45) Beginning of the discussion of working paper 
(14:38) The results of the paper 
(19:17) Movers design used to estimate the causal effect
(28:00) What makes a research idea worth pursuing? 
(36:36) The purpose and art of presentations

Episode 19: Orla Doyle and early childhood development interventions

This episode's guest is Orla Doyle, Professor at the School of Economics at University College Dublin and Director of the UCD Childhood and Human Development Research Center. We discuss her extensive experience, both in conducting research and valorizing its societal impact through policy. An excellent example is the 'Preparing For Life' - trial, an early childhood intervention, of which the age-14 follow-up study has recently been wrapped up. Read more about the trial: https://geary.ucd.ie/preparingforlife/. 
 
Guest: Orla Doyle (Professor at the School of Economics, University College Dublin) 
Hosts: Andrea De Palma and Dyllis De Pessemier 
 
Timestamps: 
(00:35) Introduction and research focus 
(09:35) The role of economists in the field of early childhood development studies 
(12:11) The 'Preparing For Life' - trial 
(30:20) Societal impact of the 'Preparing For Life' - trial 
(35:30) Project management as a researcher 
(40:15) Creating positive impact through research 
(44:15) Tips for PhD students