Our paper shows that, while there is considerable anecdotal evidence of 340B funds being used to bolster the health care safety net, there is an urgent need for more causally interpretable evidence on both intended impacts and potential unintended consequences.

The program has seen a flurry of legislative and legal activity recently, as hospitals argue that the discounts are critical to their provision of charity care and unprofitable service lines while drug manufacturers argue that the program has grown beyond its original intent.

340B allows qualifying facilities -- typically hospitals -- to purchase drugs filled at in-house or contracted external pharmacies at discounts from manufacturers.

What Economists Should Know About the 340B Drug Discounting Program The 340B Drug Pricing Program was instituted to bolster the health care safety net without relying on taxpayer money. It allows participating health care facilities—most of which are hospitals—to pur....

My paper with Joseph Garuccio reviewing the existing literature on the 340B drug discounting program has been published in the Journal of Economic Surveys: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/....