Physicians in congress: Professional backgrounds and legislative effectiveness

Abstract Despite a long history of physician service in the U.S. Congress, scholars have not yet provided a systematic study of physician members of Congress (PMCs) behavior once elected. Using publicly available data, the authors built a database of all PMCs, including years served, gender, and party affiliation since 1921, merging these data with information on PMC lawmaking activities since 1973. We show that, relative to other members, PMCs are substantially more likely to sponsor and have their health policies passed relative to other members. Further, PMCs are 66% more legislatively effective on health policy matters relative to other members. We show that these health policy effectiveness gains are isolated to health policy making and are not driven by committee assignments or ideological moderation. This work expands on the literatures related to the descriptive and substantive representation of occupational and economic class groupings as well as lawmaking effectiveness.