I am an Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri and a Research Affiliate at the Institute of Labor Economics (IZA). I am also an alum of the PEDAL Lab, Penn LDI—The Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics at the University of Pennsylvania (upenn.edu), and USC RCMAR—USC Schaeffer.

I completed my Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

I am an applied microeconomist who combines insights from economic models with empirical microeconometric analyses using quasi-experimental methods for causal inference. My research focuses on how institutional incentives, competition, and technological change affect productivity and efficiency across public, private, and mixed-oligopoly markets, with health care and education as key empirical settings.
I am interested in how emerging technologies and policy reforms shape market performance and address imperfections such as market power and information asymmetries. In my research, I use domestic and international administrative and commercial databases to answer questions that are policy-relevant in the United States and elsewhere.

I appreciate the support of my research by several organizations, including the National Institute of Aging, the Academy of Finland, the Emil Aaltonen Foundation, the Kone Foundation, and the Yrjö Jahnsson Foundation.

Curriculum Vitae
Email: lainel@missouri.edu
Address: Department of Economics, 615 Locust Street, Columbia, MO 65211, USA. Office: E223. Phone: (573) 882-1335. Pronouns: she/her