Damage Caps and the Labor Supply of Physicians: Evidence from the Third Reform Wave

Abstract

Nine states adopted caps on non-economic damages during the third medical malpractice reform wave from 2002–05, joining twenty-two other states with caps on non-economic or total damages. We study the effects of these reforms on physician supply. Across a variety of difference-in-differences (DiD), triple differences, and synthetic control methods, in both state- and county-level regressions, we find, with tight confidence intervals, no evidence that cap adoption leads to an increase in total patient care physicians, or in specialties that face high liability risk (with a possible exception for plastic surgeons), or in rural physicians.