Pinka Chatterji

Professor, Economics Link

Faculty Affiliate, Center for Aging and Policy Studies

CAPS Biography:

My area of specialization within economics is health economics, and my interests include public health insurance programs and health disparities. I have served as a PI and Co-Investigator on recent NIH-funded and other funded grants, and I have collaborated on policy-oriented projects with researchers at the New York State Department of Health. I have used secondary data sets and innovative econometric approaches to study: effects of U.S. state policies on health outcomes; education-related health disparities; racial/ethnic and education-related disparities in diabetes outcomes and depression treatment; and income-related disparities in health. My work focuses not just on estimating disparities, but also on using econometric methods to understand the causal mechanisms of health disparities. My recent work has focused on the effects of the pandemic on disparities in educational and labor market outcomes.  

Since I study health-related policies and health disparities, my research is closely linked to the health and well-being signature theme of CAPS. In addition, a major focus of my work has been on identifying causal relationships between U.S. state-level policies and health, particularly among racial/ethnic minority individuals and individuals with disabilities. This aspect of my work fits with the cross-cutting CAPS themes of policy, place, and specific populations.