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The Players



The PlayersDAVID CUTLER


OTTO ECKSTEIN PROFESSOR OF APPLIED ECONOMICS, HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Date of Birth: June 22, 1965.

Education: A.B., Harvard University; Ph.D. in economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Career Path: Cutler joined Harvard’s faculty in 1991. He served on President Bill Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisers and National Economic Council. Cutler was one of the key architects of President Barack Obama’s health plan for the primary and general elections.

Role in Health Care Reform, 1993-1994: As a member of the Clinton’s economic team, Cutler helped draft the administration’s reform proposal.

Why He’s a Player Now: Cutler remains an adviser to Obama. His research measures the value of increased health care spending in terms of the extension of life and health outcomes. Cutler believes improving the quality and value of medical care should be a key goal of reform.

Quote: “Some of the most expensive patients are the patients who have multiple co-morbidities and their treatment at this point is basically an unknown in the U.S. health care system. We do not document the different attempts by multiple physicians who treat them simultaneously. We don’t coordinate those multiple physicians. They operate as silos. And until we get a better information-infused health care system, we will not treat them better and at a lower cost.” (The Brookings Institution “The Economic Impact of Health Care Reform” event, June, 2, 2009)

Read about the other ‘Players‘.