Melina London
Sectoral chains of vulnerabilities in emerging countries: Evidence from trade credit data

Using inputs from literature regarding economic networks, this project focuses on assessing sectoral chains of vulnerabilities in emerging countries. Taking advantage of trade credit data from Coface, this study aims to assess to what extent the relationship between two sectors affects the correlation in the trade-credit default rate of those two sectors. The default rate of a sector reflects the financial health of firms within said sector, while the proximity between two sectors is measured as the amount of trade credit agreements, both direct and indirect (through other sectors). Based on the influence of each sector on the global network, this study intends to gauge whether aggregate co-movement in default rate, constructed as a sum of sector co-movements weighted by each sector’s centrality, reflect other indicators’ co-movement across countries.

Anna Zaysteva
General practitioners’ responses to declining medical density: A good news for pharmaceutical industry?, joint with Julien Silhol and Bruno Ventelou

Disparities in geographical distribution of physicians lead to important inequalities in access to healthcare, with probable impact on the quality of care, both in high and low-income countries. This paper uses a panel of French general practitioners (GPs) from 2013 to 2017 matched with administrative data to analyze the effect of practicing in an area with weaker medical density. To avoid the endogeneity issue on the location-choice of physicians, we enriched our variable of interest (practicing in an underserved area) with considering a difference between 2010 and 2015 medical density, isolating GPs who have experienced only recently a decline in density. Comparing GPs across space, we find that GPs practicing in underserved areas have shorter consultation lengths, and tend to substitute time-consuming medical procedures in favor of human-resources-saving alternatives, e.g.: they prescribe less paramedics (nurses, physical therapists) and more drugs (or are less likely to deprescribe). These findings refresh the traditional view on the substitution effect between drug prescription and the length of consultation; GPs in underserved areas do not only save their time, they also have to anticipate on the scarcity of their paramedical colleagues, with significant impact on the mix-of-care by which the patients are treated.