Daniel P. Kessler

- Professor of Law
- Keith and Jan Hurlbut Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution
- Room N323, Neukom Building
Expertise
- Antitrust Law
- Health Law & Policy
- Law & Economics
Biography
David S. and Ann M. Barlow Professor in Management, Graduate School of Business; Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution; Professor (by courtesy) of Health Research and Policy, School of Medicine
An expert on health policy and health care finance, Daniel P. Kessler’s scholarship is particularly timely. His recent book, Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise: Five Steps to a Better Health Care System (with John Cogan and R. Glenn Hubbard), outlines how market-based health care reform in the U.S. can help fix our system’s current problems. His recent research examines how tax policy affects medical spending. His research interests also include empirical studies in antitrust law and law and economics.
Currently he is investigating how vertical integration and other shared ownership structures in markets for health services affect the cost and quality of care. A senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a professor of health research and policy (by courtesy) with the Stanford School of Medicine, Professor Kessler, JD ’93, has been on the Stanford Graduate School of Business faculty for 15 years—and now brings to the law school a uniquely interdisciplinary perspective to his teaching. He is also a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Professor Kessler has won awards for his advising and research from Stanford, the National Institute for Health Care Management Foundation and the International Health Economics Association. He has received grants from the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation and the California HealthCare Foundation. He has served as a consultant to corporations, foundations and the governments of the United States and Canada. He has taught courses in health economics, public policy and antitrust law at Stanford, Harvard and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He has published numerous papers in economics journals and law reviews. He has also appeared on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer and written several articles on health reform for The Wall Street Journal and Health Affairs.
Education
- JD Stanford Law School 1993
- PhD (Economics) Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Policy Practicum: Advising Congress on Health Policy
This policy lab will conduct research on national health policy problems for the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, or MedPAC (MedPAC is an independent Congressional agency established by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 to advise the U.S. Congress on issues affecting the Medicare program). Students will work in teams with lawyers and PhD economists from MedPAC, resident and fellow physicians from Stanford Hospital and other students from throughout the University on one of two topics: Expanding the healthcare workforce through reform of states’ scope of practice regulation.
view practicum : Policy Practicum: Advising Congress on Health PolicyKey Works
News
Stanford and Columbia Scholars Propose Novel Tax Plan that Could Reduce Private Health Care Spending by $86 Billion a Year
Stanford Law School
This news story was originally published by the Stanford Graduate School of Business. STANFORD, Calif., February 7, 2013—Long before Democrats passed their sweeping health care reform in 2010, economists across the political spectrum had argued that bad tax incentives were a major contributor to the soaring cost of American medical…
Read More : Stanford and Columbia Scholars Propose Novel Tax Plan that Could Reduce Private Health Care Spending by $86 Billion a Year