About

Atul Gupta is an Assistant Professor in the department of Health Care Management at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, and holds the title of Dorinda and Mark Winkelman Distinguished Faculty Scholar. He joined Wharton in 2017 after earning his PhD in Economics from Stanford University. His research interests encompass Applied Microeconomics, Health Care, Public Finance, and Industrial Organization. Gupta's work examines various determinants of productivity in the US health care sector, including provider payment contract reforms, ownership and organizational structure effects, consolidation, advertising, and the expansion of managed care in public insurance. His research has been published in leading economics and health policy journals and has been featured by major news outlets. Notably, his study on private equity ownership in nursing homes was cited in the 2022 State of the Union and influenced subsequent regulations aimed at increasing transparency in nursing home ownership.

Research topics

• Finance
• Business
• Political Science
• Actuarial science
• Public economics
• Medicine
• Economics
• Nursing
• Microeconomics
• Economic growth
• Operations management

Selected publications

• Data and Code for "Turbocharging Profits? Contract Gaming and Revenue Allocation in Healthcare"

  ICPSR Data Holdings · 2026-03-30

  datasetOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Code and publicly available data to replicate "Turbocharging Profits? Contract Gaming and Revenue Allocation in Healthcare".<br><br><b>Abstract:</b> Firms often exploit weaknesses in government contracts to boost revenues, yet little is known about how they allocate these funds. We study how hospitals allocated $3 billion obtained from gaming a Medicare loophole. The average gaming hospital increased Medicare and total revenue by around 10%, implying large spillovers on other payers. Nonprofit hospitals deployed most funds toward operating costs. For-profits--driven by a large chain--deducted funds off their balance sheets, distributing them to executives and shareholders. Accordingly, we detect reductions in mortality only at nonprofits. Our results imply that the consequences of engineered windfalls vary substantially by hospital ownership.<br>

  PublisherDOI

• Does Advertising Expand the Market for Hospital Services? Evidence from Medicare

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2026-01-01

  preprintOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• Data and Code for "Turbocharging Profits? Contract Gaming and Revenue Allocation in Healthcare"

  ICPSR Data Holdings · 2026-03-30

  datasetOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Code and publicly available data to replicate "Turbocharging Profits? Contract Gaming and Revenue Allocation in Healthcare".<br><br><b>Abstract:</b> Firms often exploit weaknesses in government contracts to boost revenues, yet little is known about how they allocate these funds. We study how hospitals allocated $3 billion obtained from gaming a Medicare loophole. The average gaming hospital increased Medicare and total revenue by around 10%, implying large spillovers on other payers. Nonprofit hospitals deployed most funds toward operating costs. For-profits--driven by a large chain--deducted funds off their balance sheets, distributing them to executives and shareholders. Accordingly, we detect reductions in mortality only at nonprofits. Our results imply that the consequences of engineered windfalls vary substantially by hospital ownership.<br>

  PublisherDOI

• Skilled Nursing Facility Value-Based Purchasing Failed To Achieve Hospital Readmission Reductions And Other Targets

  Health Affairs · 2025-06-01 · 4 citations

  article

  Medicare's Skilled Nursing Facility Value-Based Purchasing (SNF VBP) Program is the largest pay-for-performance initiative ever implemented to improve care in SNFs. The program ties SNF performance in reducing thirty-day hospital readmissions among Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries admitted from the hospital for postacute care to financial rewards or penalties of up to 2 percent of annual Medicare fee-for-service payments to SNFs. Using 2011-21 data from the Medicare Provider Analysis and Review files and other sources, we conducted a difference-in-differences analysis to determine whether the SNF VBP Program was successful in reducing thirty-day readmissions among the target population. Our analysis compared patient outcomes over time in SNFs in the highest quartile of Medicare-paid bed-days (which would be most sensitive to the financial impacts of the program) with those in the lowest quartile. We found that the program had no impact on thirty-day hospital readmissions, thirty-day mortality rates, SNF length-of-stay, or 100-day community discharge rates overall or in specific SNF subgroups during the period 2015-21. In light of changes made to the SNF VBP Program in fiscal year 2024, ongoing monitoring and additional research will be critical to efforts that assess the program's impact and inform SNF quality improvement policies and programs in the years ahead.

  PublisherDOI

• Therapeutic Efficacy of Injectable Hydrogel Systems in Mice Tumor Models

  Preprints.org · 2025-06-06

  preprintOpen access

  Background: This study explored the use of a 3D hydrogel, a tissue-engineering method designed to enhance stromal lymphoid cell therapy and boost the immune response of antibodies. Mouse models of two tumor types—B16F10 melanoma and MC-38 colorectal carcinoma—were used in two separate studies to assess the in vivo immune response to this approach.Methods: In the B16F10 melanoma study, 42 mice were randomized into six groups: Group 1, saline; Groups 2 &amp;amp;3, escalating doses of anti-cytotoxic T-lymphocyte-associated protein 4(anti-CTLA4 and anti-programmed death 1( anti-PD-1) antibodies; Group 4, combination of hydrogel, inhibitors, and fibroblastic reticular cells (FRCs); Group 5, 3D hydrogel, FRCs, and cytokines; Group 6, hydrogel, checkpoint inhibitors, FRCs, and cytokines.In the MC-38 colorectal carcinoma study, 100 mice were randomized into ten groups: Group 1, saline; Groups 2 to 4, escalating doses of anti-CTLA4 and anti-PD-1 antibodies; Groups 5 to 7, the same escalating doses combined with a 3D hydrogel; Groups 8 to 10, higher doses combined with a 3D hydrogel, along with the addition of FRCs.Results: Hydrogel capsules harvested five days post-injection revealed lymph node-like structures. Mice treated with FRCs and biologics in 3D hydrogel showed a remarkable increase in survival rate and complete response. Conclusion: The study highlights the potential of 3D hydrogels to improve immunotherapy. While promising survival outcomes were observed in animal models, further research is needed to confirm these findings in humans. The results support the approach’s clinical potential and lay the groundwork for future advancements in cancer treatment.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Size of the Financial Incentives in Medicare’s Skilled Nursing Facility Value-Based Purchasing Program

  JAMA Network Open · 2025-09-24 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access

  Importance: The Skilled Nursing Facility Value-Based Purchasing (SNF VBP) program is the largest test to date of the use of financial incentives to incentivize reductions in hospital readmissions from SNFs. Initial evaluations suggest the program was not successful, and a key question is to what extent the size and distribution of the financial incentives may have played a role. Objective: To measure the scale and scope of the SNF VBP financial incentives in the first 3 years of the program in which incentives were assessed (2019-2021). Design, Setting, and Participants: This is a retrospective cohort study of eligible stays, associated Medicare reimbursement amounts, financial incentive percentage assessed by SNF VBP, and proportion of financial incentive to SNF net operating revenue for each participating SNF in each year of the program. All SNFs certified by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services are required to participate in the VBP program. Participants included fee-for-service Medicare beneficiaries discharged from hospital to SNF for postacute care using the same inclusion and exclusion criteria as the SNF VBP program. Data were analyzed from March 2022 to December 2024. Exposures: Financial penalties (up to 2% of all Medicare fee-for-service reimbursement for that year) or bonuses (up to 3% of all Medicare fee-for-service reimbursement for that year) for performance on risk-adjusted 30-day readmission rates. Main Outcomes and Measures: The primary outcomes were the annual amount of Medicare revenue subject to financial incentive and the financial incentive percentage for SNFs in the program, calculated by multiplying the total annual fee-for-service revenue for each SNF by the incentive multiplier published in the public SNF VBP data files. Results: The analytic sample included 5 392 281 qualifying SNF stays in 14 189 SNFs. In the first 3 years of the program, the median (IQR) reimbursement adjustment across SNFs was -$10 336 (-$27 373 to $0), or 0.15% of the median SNF net operating income. Financial incentives varied greatly from year to year for individual SNFs: only 22.3% of SNFs (3167 SNFs) remained in the same quartile in all 3 years, and a substantial minority of those that changed quartiles moved more than 1 quartile from year to year (38.3% [2890 SNFs] from 2019 to 2020, and 44.3% [3101 SNFs] from 2020 to 2021). Conclusions and Relevance: This cohort study of the SNF VBP program found that financial incentives were small, with large year-to-year variability for individual SNFs. This may have limited the program's ability to induce meaningful investments to reduce hospital readmission.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Design, Analysis and Experimental Verification of a RC-MOV Based Solid State Circuit Breaker

  2024-07-31 · 1 citations

  article

  Due to the distributed energy resources (DER) and renewable energy integration, there is a growing need for reliable, fast and safe circuit breaking technology. Solid state circuit breaker (SSCB) uses solid state devices as a tripping unit and provides faster tripping with no arcing. The main challenge of an SSCB is to design a simple and cost-effective voltage clamping circuit. This paper proposes a design method of RC and metal-oxide varistor (MOV) based voltage clamping circuit for SSCB. An equivalent circuit is derived from which the suitable values of R and C are determined. Moreover, the advantage of using MOV is also explained. The proposed design is verified in a harware prototype of 240V, 6A SSCB.

  PublisherDOI

• Replication Data for "The Corporatization of Independent Hospitals"

  Harvard Dataverse · 2024-01-01

  datasetOpen access

  This includes the replication package and public data files for the paper The Corporatization of Independent Hospitals accepted by JPE Microeconomics in 2023.

  PublisherDOI

• Turbocharging Profits? Contract Gaming and Revenue Allocation in Healthcare

  National Bureau of Economic Research · 2024-06-01 · 6 citations

  reportOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Firms often exploit loopholes in government contracts to boost revenues. The welfare consequences of this behavior depend on how firms use the marginal windfall dollar, yet little evidence exists to guide policymakers. This paper studies how hospitals allocated over $3 billion obtained from gaming a Medicare payment loophole. The average gaming hospital increased both Medicare and total revenue by around 10%, implying large spillovers on other payers. Consistent with theories of organizational behavior, nonprofit hospitals deployed most of the windfall toward operating costs, while for-profits deducted the entire amount off their balance sheet, distributing a substantial portion to executives and shareholders. Accordingly, we detect modest reductions in mortality rates at nonprofits but no changes at for-profits. Our results imply that the consequences of such engineered windfalls vary substantially by hospital ownership.

  PublisherDOI

• The Corporatization of Independent Hospitals

  Journal of Political Economy Microeconomics · 2024-03-15 · 4 citations

  article

  Little is known about how system ownership affects hospital operations, though they control 80% of hospital beds. We combine multiple data sources, including novel price data from a large commercial insurer, to study over 100 independent hospitals that enter system ownership. The targets obtain differentially higher prices, relative to a matched comparison group, but far greater cost reductions, primarily through reducing labor and financing costs. In contrast, we do not detect operating-cost reductions at 135 system-owned hospitals acquired by other systems, suggesting that these savings are mostly realized on the initial transition to system ownership.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Amol S. Navathe

  University of Pennsylvania

  14 shared

• Justin E. Bekelman

  University of Pennsylvania

  11 shared

• Amy Finkelstein

  National Bureau of Economic Research

  6 shared

• Ezra Fishman

  National Committee for Quality Assurance

  5 shared

• Ravi B. Parikh

  Penn Center for AIDS Research

  5 shared

• Sabrina T Howell

  5 shared

• Liran Einav

  Stanford University

  5 shared

• Gosia Sylwestrzak

  5 shared

Labs

• Health Care ManagementPI

Awards & honors

• Dorinda and Mark Winkelman Distinguished Faculty Scholar