About

Neale Mahoney is the Trione Director of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR) and the TG Wijaya Professor of Economics at Stanford University. He is also a George P. Shultz Fellow at SIEPR, a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and an Affiliated Professor at J-PAL. In 2022-2023, he served as a Special Policy Advisor for Economic Policy in the White House National Economic Council. Mahoney is an applied micro-economist with research interests in healthcare and consumer financial markets. He is a member of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Academic Research Council. His educational background includes a PhD and MA in economics from Stanford University and an ScB in applied mathematics-economics from Brown University. Prior to his current position, he was a Professor of Economics and David G. Booth Faculty Fellow at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, and he worked for the Obama Administration on healthcare reform. His research contributions have been recognized with awards such as the ASHEcon Medal in 2021 and a Sloan Research Fellowship in 2016.

Research topics

• Economics
• Business
• Finance
• Medicine
• Environmental health
• Actuarial science
• Economic growth
• Financial system

Selected publications

• Overlapping Policy Interventions: Evidence from Home Health

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• The Rise of Healthcare Jobs

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  articleOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• Racial Differences in Nursing Home Value Added

  National Bureau of Economic Research · 2025-10-01

  reportOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• The Rise of Healthcare Jobs

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• Producing Health: Measuring Value Added of Nursing Homes

  Econometrica · 2025-01-01 · 5 citations

  articleSenior author

  We develop a stylized model that allows us to estimate a value‐added measure for nursing homes (“SNFs”) which accounts for patient selection both into and out of a SNF. We use the model, together with detailed data on the physical and mental health of about 6 million Medicare SNF patients between 2011 and 2016, to estimate the value added for about 14,000 distinct SNFs. We document substantial heterogeneity in value added. Nationwide, compared to a 10th percentile SNF, a 90th percentile SNF is able to discharge a patient at the same health level almost a week sooner, or one quarter of the median length of stay. Heterogeneity in value added within a market is almost as large as it is nationwide. Our results point to the potential for substantial gains through policies that encourage reallocation of patients to higher‐quality SNFs within their market.

  PublisherDOI

• The Rise of Healthcare Jobs

  National Bureau of Economic Research · 2025-03-01

  reportOpen access

  Healthcare employment has grown more than twice as fast as the labor force since 1980, overtaking retail trade to become the largest industry by employment in 2009.We document key facts about the rise of healthcare jobs.Earnings for healthcare workers have risen nearly twice as fast as those in other industries, with relatively large increases in the middle and upper-middle parts of the earnings distribution.Healthcare workers have remained predominantly female, with increases in the share of female doctors offsetting increases in the shares of male nurses and aides.Despite a few highprofile examples to the contrary, regions experiencing manufacturing job losses have not systematically reinvented themselves by pivoting from ``manufacturing to meds.''

  PublisherDOI

• Selling Subscriptions

  American Economic Review · 2025-05-01 · 7 citations

  articleSenior author

  We study one benefit to firms of selling subscriptions: the prospect that consumers will continue to pay for subscriptions they no longer value. We use comprehensive data from a large payment card network to document that months during which cards are replaced, when active renewal is required, are associated with much higher rates of cancellation. Using two stylized models of consumer inertia—driven by inattention or switching costs—we estimate that these cancellation frictions roughly double seller revenues on average, holding fixed initial subscribers. We use the estimated models to explore the impact of possible regulatory remedies. (JEL D12, D18, L81, L88)

  PublisherDOI

• Overlapping Policy Interventions: Evidence from Home Health

  National Bureau of Economic Research · 2025-12-01

  reportOpen accessSenior author

  Governments often concurrently deploy multiple policy instruments to tackle a common objective, yet researchers typically analyze each policy's impacts independently.We study interactions across policies and their implications within the context of efforts to reduce Medicare-financed home health services.We consider two geographically targeted policies: strike force prosecutions of suspected fraud and moratoria on the entry of new home health agencies.Depending on location and time, we observe either both, one, or neither policy in place.Individually, each policy reduced home health use substantially, and was well-targeted to places with higher treatment effects.Although we estimate only a modest interaction between the two policies, we find that optimally allocating them across the areas that received at least one policy could have increased their total impact by about 20% relative to the observed placement.Our exercise highlights the potential gains from coordination across different policy instruments pursuing similar objectives.

  PublisherDOI

• Why Regulate Junk Fees?

  The Journal of Economic Perspectives · 2025-11-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  This essay examines the growing prevalence of junk fees, including mandatory back-end fees and hidden add-on charges, which obscure the true cost of goods and services. Drawing on examples from event tickets, hotels, cable bills, restaurants, and financial services, I show how these pricing practices increase search costs and equilibrium prices, distort consumer choices, and divert innovation toward exploitative rather than value-enhancing strategies. Economic theory and evidence suggest that competition and disclosure alone are often insufficient to discipline junk fees. I review recent regulatory responses, including federal and state rules that require all-in-one upfront pricing, and discuss their implications for consumer welfare and market efficiency. The rapid evolution of junk fee policies provides economists with rich opportunities to study their intended and unintended consequences. At its core, the case for regulating junk fees rests not on paternalism but on enhancing market functioning.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Disclosing the costs of co-holding liquid assets and high-interest debt has limited impact on behavior

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen access
  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• Empirical Studies of Financial Incentives in Publicly Provided Health Care

  NSF · $217k · 2017–2022

Frequent coauthors

• Amy Finkelstein

  National Bureau of Economic Research

  107 shared

• Marika Cabral

  The University of Texas at Austin

  102 shared

• Johannes Stroebel

  96 shared

• Souphala Chomsisengphet

  81 shared

• Sumit Agarwal

  National University of Singapore

  68 shared

• Liran Einav

  Stanford University

  66 shared

• E. Glen Weyl

  54 shared

• Matthew Notowidigdo

  University of Chicago

  34 shared

Education

• Ph.D., Economics

  Stanford University

Awards & honors

• ASHEcon Medal (2021)
• Sloan Research Fellowship (2016)