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Tina Highfill

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Research Economist

Tina Highfill

tina.highfill@bea.gov
(301) 278-9266

Google Scholar Page

Education

Ph.D.
Virginia Commonwealth University
Health Services Organization and Research
M.A.
Johns Hopkins University
Applied Economics
B.A.
Virginia Tech
Economics

Areas of Interest

Research Design
Health Services Research
Organizational Theory
Understanding global value chains by accounting for firm heterogeneity in US production within industries tanya.shen Tue, 11/30/2021 - 11:31
External Paper/Article

Research has shown that multinational enterprises located in the US account for roughly 90% of US exports of goods and for over 90% of exports of selected services. While these estimates show that multinationals clearly dominate trading activity of gross exports, they overstate the role of multinationals in US exports since non-multinationals are an important part of the production supply chain and make significant contributions to the value embodied in these exports. This column uses experimental Trade in Value Added statistics estimated from extended supply-use tables for the US for 2005 and 2012 to show that both multinational and non-multinational firms contribute significant amounts of content embodied in US exports.

 
Additional Information

 

 

James J. Fetzer , Tina Highfill , Kassu W. Hossiso , Erich H. Strassner , and Jeffrey A. Young

Understanding global value chains by accounting for firm heterogeneity in US pr…

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Using disability adjusted life years to value the treatment of thirty chronic conditions in the U.S. from 1987 to 2010: a proof of concept tanya.shen Wed, 09/20/2023 - 16:09
External Paper/Article

Health care spending in the U.S. grew two trillion dollars from 1987 to 2010, a 400% increase, but our understanding of the value of that increase is limited. In this paper we estimate the net value of spending for thirty chronic diseases between 1987 and 2010 by assigning a monetary value to changes in health outcomes and relating it to the costs of treating each disease. Changes in health outcomes are measured using a newly-available time series of disability adjusted life years (DALYs) data from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. Spending on treatments are determined using health care expenditure data from nationally representative surveys. We find the net value of treatment has grown substantially for several diseases. Overall, 20 of the 30 chronic conditions studied experienced an increase in health outcomes over the period, with 8 of those 20 showing a decrease in per-patient spending. Our estimates of net value of health spending using DALYs data are simple to apply and results are generally consistent with previous estimates which usually involve onerous data collection methods to study a single disease. The DALYs data have potential to be a useful, low-cost way to measure changes in health outcomes. However, challenges remain in using DALYs data to accurately measure the changing value of health care spending on the treatment of disease.

 
Additional Information

 

 

Tina Highfill

Using disability adjusted life years to value the treatment of thirty chronic c…

International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Vol. 19, pages 449–466

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