Busbee Chair in Public Policy
Professor of Public Administration and Policy
W. David Bradford, Ph.D., is a health economist and the George D. Busbee Chair in Public Policy in the Department of Public Administration and Policy at the University of Georgia. Prior to joining UGA, he was the Director and founder of the Center for Health Economic and Policy Studies at the Medical University of South Carolina and an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at the University of New Hampshire. He has also been a visiting (sabbatical) professor at Yale Medical School and the Talbott Visiting Professor at the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy at the University of Virginia.
Dr. Bradford’s research ranges across diverse fields, including substance use policy, pharmaceutical policy (advertising, drug pricing, and off-label prescribing), housing instability, and the role that time and risk preferences play in individual decision-making. Currently, a significant portion of his research efforts involves understanding the impact of cannabis and opioid policies on health behaviors and outcomes. In addition, he has active research projects with several coauthors investigating the interrelationship between landlord-tenant policies, eviction, and homelessness – and how those outcomes impact deaths of despair.
Dr. Bradford serves or has served multiple editorial roles. He is a Co-Editor for Health Economics and has been an Associate Editor for Implementation Research and Practice. He serves as an elected Board Member of the American Society of Health Economists. He also chairs the oversight boards of the Southeastern Health Economics Study Group annual conference. He has served two terms as a Board Member of the International Health Economics Association. Finally, Dr. Bradford frequently provides expert witness testimony in healthcare-related litigation and has been a member of multiple National Institutes of Health study sections in permanent and ad hoc roles.