Director
Richard M. Scheffler, PhD [View CV, View Publications]
Richard M. Scheffler is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Health Economics and Public Policy at the School of Public Health and the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley. He is also the Chair Emeritus in Healthcare Markets and Consumer Welfare endowed by the Office of the Attorney General for the State of California in 1999. In addition to directing the Petris Center, Dr. Scheffler is also the Director of the Global Center for Health Economics and Policy Research. He has been a visiting professor at the London School of Economics, Charles University in Prague, at the Department of Economics at the University of Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona and at Carlos III University of Madrid, Spain. Dr. Scheffler has been a visiting scholar at the World Bank, the Rockefeller Foundation in Bellagio, and the Institute of Medicine at the National Academy of Sciences and a consultant for the World Bank, the WHO, and the OECD. Professor Scheffler has been a Fulbright Scholar at Pontifica Universidad Catolica de Chile in Santiago, Chile, and at Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic. He was awarded the Chair of Excellence Award at the Carlos III University of Madrid in 2013. In 2015, Dr. Scheffler was awarded the Gold Medal for Charles University in Prague for his longstanding and continued support of international scientific and educational collaboration. In 2018, Petris Center Director Dr. Richard M. Scheffler was awarded the Berkeley Citation, among the highest honors the campus bestows on its community presented on behalf of the Chancellor to individuals whose contributions to UC Berkeley go beyond the call of duty and whose achievements exceed the standards of excellence in their fields.
Staff Members
Brent D. Fulton, PhD, MBA – Associate Director [View CV]
Brent D. Fulton, Ph.D., MBA, is an Associate Professor of Health Economics and Public Policy, and Associate Director of the Nicholas C. Petris Center on Health Care Markets and Consumer Welfare, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley. His research areas include healthcare market concentration, health insurance markets (rate review regulation, risk adjustment and reinsurance), health reform (accountable care organizations), health workforce (pay for performance and task shifting), and mental health services (attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder). Brent’s doctorate is in public policy analysis from Pardee RAND Graduate School and his MBA is from the University of California, Los Angeles.
Daniel Arnold, PhD – Research Director [View CV]
Daniel Arnold is the Research Director of the Nicholas C. Petris Center on Health Care Markets and Consumer Welfare. He conducts research in the fields of health economics, industrial organization, and behavioral economics. His current research focuses on the impact of market concentration on hospital and physician prices, plan choice in the ACA Exchanges, and the drivers and consequences of anxiety disorder among Millennials. Dr. Arnold obtained his doctorate in economics from the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Jamie Godwin – Graduate Student Researcher [View CV]
Jamie Godwin is a PhD Candidate in Health Policy & Management at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health. His research interests center around healthcare industry competition, expenditures, insurance, and pricing. Jamie’s dissertation focuses on hospital and private insurance market structure in the state of California. Prior to joining the Petris Center, Jamie worked as a graduate student researcher at the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, studying pay for performance quality improvement initiatives and other delivery system reform programs. Jamie worked in healthcare consulting and electronic medical records implementation before beginning his graduate studies. He holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Patrick Crocker, JD, LLM – Graduate Student Researcher [View CV]
Patrick is a graduate student researcher at the Nicholas C. Petris Center on Healthcare Markets and Consumer Welfare. He is currently an MBA student with a concentration in Health Management at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley. Prior to coming to Berkeley, Patrick spent a decade in the U.S. Army as a Judge Advocate, mostly practicing in the criminal, operational, and intelligence law fields. He holds a BS in psychology from Texas Christian University, an MS in criminal justice from Virginia Commonwealth University, a JD from the University of Richmond School of Law, and an LLM in criminal law from the the U.S. Army’s Judge Advocate General’s School.
Lizzie Jekanowski – Graduate Student Researcher
Lizzie Jekanowski is currently a Master of Public Policy and Master of Public Health dual degree candidate at the Goldman School of Public Policy and School of Public Health. Her research interests include reproductive justice policy, provider incentives, health care operations, racial justice and queer liberation. Prior to UC Berkeley, Lizzie supported child and adult sexual assault survivors at the YWCA Rape Crisis Center and provided comprehensive reproductive health care and abortion services at Planned Parenthood Mar Monte. Lizzie graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Boston College in 2013 with a B.A. in Political Science and Women’s & Gender Studies.
Alexandra Peltz – Undergraduate Research Assistant [View CV]
Alex Peltz is an undergraduate research assistant at the Nicholas C. Petris Center. Alex is a fourth-year student at the University of California, Berkeley majoring in Public Health and pursuing minors in Public Policy and English. Alex is interested in health policy particularly with respect to healthcare accessibility and universal healthcare. Alex is also interested in data and econometric analysis and aspires to learn more about health policy research as she continues to work at the Petris Center. Alex hopes to pursue a Master’s in Biostatistics or work at a think tank following graduation. Ruhee Wadhwania – Undergraduate Research Assistant [View CV]
Ruhee is an undergraduate research assistant at the Petris Center. She is a senior at UC Berkeley double-majoring in Public Health and Economics . Ruhee’s research interests lie in the areas of health economics and efficiency as well as health policy and its effects on marginalized communities. Ruhee’s work experience specialized in the markets surrounding health systems and taught her to connect the worlds of data science and public health, which she hopes to carry into her research at the Petris Center. After graduation, she aspires to work in the field of health policy, continuing to conduct health policy research that promotes health equity.
Taylor Wang – Undergraduate Research Assistant
Taylor is an undergraduate research assistant at the Nicholas C. Petris Center. She is a senior at Berkeley studying Economics and her research interests lie in the field of health economics as well as health policy. Taylor is interested in applying econometrics to her interest in access to health care, particularly within the pharmaceutical sphere. After graduation, she will be working within economic consulting and hopes to pursue a PhD in Applied Economics in the future.