The birth of the congressional clinic

Abstract

This paper studies the impact of mortality in the districts/states represented in key congressional groups (i.e. committees, subcommittees, and parties) on the National Institutes of Health (NIH) allocation of medical research funds across diseases, for the period 1985-2002. Exploiting the recomposition of any group after congressional elections, I find that congressmen who sit in the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies appear successful in steering more funds towards research on diseases that affect their constituents disproportionately. This effect is larger for clinical than for basic research. No other relevant congressional group, except, to a lesser extent, the House majority, seems to impact that allocation. No group significantly impacts the allocation of funds across states.