Assistant Professor of Economics, University of Malaga
I am an applied economist using causal inference to answer policy-relevant questions in health and public economics. My work exploits natural experiments, difference-in-differences, and event-study designs to evaluate how institutional reforms shape access, equity, and quality in publicly funded health systems.
PhD in Economics from the University of Granada (2023), visiting researcher at the London School of Economics.
Address: Departamento de Economía Aplicada (Hacienda Pública),
Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Empresariales,
Universidad de Málaga, 29071 Málaga, Spain
Research
Published
Waiting times in healthcare: equal treatment for equal need?
Juan David García-Corchero & Dolores Jiménez-Rubio
International Journal for Equity in Health, 21, 184 (2022)
In many universal health systems, waiting times act as a non-monetary rationing mechanism, one that should be based on clinical need rather than the ability to pay. However, there is growing evidence that among patients with similar levels of need, waiting times often differ according to socioeconomic status. Using Spanish data, we examine whether waiting times for primary and specialist care depend on patients' socioeconomic status (SES) and employ quantile regression to explore variations across the waiting time distribution. Our results reveal the presence of a SES gradient in waiting times for specialist services explained on the basis of education, employment status and income. For primary care, a more moderate SES gradient appears. Although SES differences diminish for longer waiting times in the public sector, they persist throughout the distribution. The findings indicate that the principle of equal treatment for equal need, assumed to be inherent to national health systems such as the Spanish system, is not applied in practice.
How do policy levers shape the quality of a national health system? An empirical analysis
Juan David García-Corchero & Dolores Jiménez-Rubio
Poor quality of care may have a detrimental effect on access and take-up and can become a serious barrier to the universality of health services. Using patient satisfaction as a proxy for the quality of health care and longitudinal and cross-sectional data for Spain, we employ multilevel estimation techniques to show that policy levers — particularly public health spending and the patient-doctor ratio — exert considerable influence on the quality of a health care system. The results suggest that policymakers seeking to enhance the quality of care should be cautious when compromising the level of health resources, particularly health personnel, as a response to economic downturns. We also find evidence that increased private sector reliance may indicate inefficiencies in public healthcare systems or reflect patient preferences for private insurance features.
Working Papers
The effect of patient choice on health care utilisation
Joan Costa-Font & Juan David García-Corchero
Work in progress
Does patient choice affect patient involvement?
Joan Costa-Font, Juan David García-Corchero & Danielle Subsataya
Work in progress
Political demand for healthcare after austerity
Joan Costa-Font, Juan David García-Corchero & Dolores Jiménez-Rubio
Work in progress
The socioeconomic gradient in waiting times for patient choice
Ángel Fernández-Pérez & Juan David García-Corchero
Work in progress
Reporting bias and prompt attention in health surveys
Juan David García-Corchero, Dolores Jiménez-Rubio & Juan Vidris
Work in progress
The effect of fasting on academic performance among Muslim students
Healthcare waiting times (1): Equal treatment for equal need?
Juan David García-Corchero, Dolores Jiménez-Rubio & Laia Bosque-Mercader
Nada es Gratis, May 2023
Evidence of a socioeconomic gradient in waiting times for specialist care in Spain: university-educated patients wait 9–16 fewer days than those without formal education.
Healthcare waiting times (2): Inequality in scheduled surgeries too?
Laia Bosque-Mercader & Juan David García-Corchero
Nada es Gratis, May 2023
Analysis of administrative data from Catalan hospitals (2015–2019) showing that higher-income patients experience shorter surgical waits in 8 of 10 procedures — within the same hospitals.
Assessing quality and equity in the Spanish NHS from the patient perspective
Juan David García-Corchero
Blog Economía y Salud (AES), August 2023
Summary of my doctoral thesis: how healthcare policy instruments influence citizen satisfaction and how socioeconomic inequalities shape access in Spain's decentralised health system.
What lies behind waiting time inequalities in public healthcare?
Juan David García-Corchero & Laia Bosque-Mercader
Blog Economía y Salud (AES), November 2024
Preliminary findings from the EQUIMEC project: demand-side and supply-side mechanisms behind waiting time inequalities, with evidence that Madrid's free provider choice policy may have reduced disparities for lower-income patients.
Grants & Projects
EQUIMEC Project — Principal Investigator. Funded by AES (Asociación de Economía de la Salud) & Novartis Foundation.
Teaching
University of Malaga (2024–present)
Hacienda Pública I Public Finance I— BSc in Economics, 2024–25, 2025–26
Hacienda Pública II Public Finance II— BSc in Economics, 2024–25, 2025–26
Economía de los Ingresos Públicos Economics of Public Revenue— MA in Economic Analysis (MAES), 2025–26
University of Granada (2019–2023)
Economía Española Spanish Economy— BSc in Economics, 2019–2023
Hacienda Pública I Public Finance I— BSc in Economics, 2022–2023
Workshop in Health Economics
— University of York, 2022
EvaluAES Workshop
— Evaluation methods in health economics
AESEC Conference (Asociación Española de Salud y Economía)
— Coordinator & organiser
Refereeing
Reviewer for:
Value in Health
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization
Health Policy & Planning
Data & Code
My research relies primarily on Stata for econometric analysis and Python for data processing. Replication code for published papers is available upon request.
