Who We Are
Tradeoffs started with a simple idea: There are no silver bullets in health care. Dan Gorenstein learned this covering the business of health care at the public radio show Marketplace. Economists, physicians and researchers taught him even the most well-intentioned plans to fix issues like unaffordable insurance, high prescription drug prices and inequitable care for marginalized patients carried risk and unintended consequences. He struggled to fit all that nuance and complexity into his short radio stories.
He thought a show that examined research, outlined policy pros and cons and chronicled how policy impacted spending and people could help folks on Main Street, Wall Street and Capitol Hill have smarter, more honest conversations about health policy. In the fall of 2019, Dan and University of Pennsylvania community health expert Courtney Summers launched Tradeoffs, a show that tells intellectually engaging, emotionally resonant stories about the complicated, costly and often counterintuitive world of health care.
Our Team
Dan Gorenstein, Founder and Executive Editor
Before founding Tradeoffs, Dan was the senior reporter for Marketplace’s Health Desk, covering the business of health care, and before that, he spent more than 11 years at New Hampshire Public Radio. He got his start in journalism at the Chicago Reporter, an investigative journal that examines race and class disparities in the Chicago area. He’s won numerous national and local awards, including the Society of Professional Journalist Sigma Delta Chi investigative reporting award. As the Founder and Executive Editor, Dan sets the vision for Tradeoffs’ journalism and strategic direction.
Email: dgorenstein@tradeoffs.org
Twitter: @dmgorenstein
Ryan Levi, Reporter/Producer
Ryan has been reporting and producing stories for Tradeoffs since 2019. Before that, he spent three years doing a little bit of everything at KQED, the NPR member station in the San Francisco Bay Area, and his work has been featured on NPR’s Morning Edition and Here and Now. When he’s not reporting, Ryan loves baking and reading.
Email: rlevi@tradeoffs.org
Twitter: @ryan_levi
Sayeh Nikpay, PhD, MPH, Senior Research Advisor
Sayeh has been a part of the Tradeoffs team since 2019. She helps Tradeoffs stay up on the latest health policy research on air and in the weekly Tradeoffs newsletter. She is an associate professor in the Division of Health Policy and Management at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, and her research focuses on the impact of health reform on labor market decisions of individuals and hospital finance. She served as a staff economist at the Council of Economic Advisers from 2010-2011.
Twitter: @saynikpay
Andrew Parrella, Producer and Sound Designer
Andrew began working on Tradeoffs in 2018, helping to create the pilot episodes to see if this ship could fly … turns out it can! He spent more than 15 years producing live radio and podcasts at public radio stations in New Hampshire (NHPR) and Boston (WGBH). In addition to making Tradeoffs sound beautiful, he also runs Methusaleh Productions, where he helps passionate individuals start their own podcasts. He’s been known to play AC/DC on his ukulele.
Email: aparrella@tradeoffs.org
Twitter: @NhParrella
Leslie Walker, Senior Producer
Leslie joined Tradeoffs in the early days of 2019. She reports, produces and edits episodes for the show. Leslie has had what’s now fashionably known as a “nonlinear career,” having worked in health care, startups, communications and politics — and she even co-owned an artisan bread bakery.
Email: lwalker@tradeoffs.org
Twitter: @leslie_walker_
Shannon Crane, Audience Engagement Lead
Shannon Crane joined Tradeoffs in 2022, and as the Audience Engagement Lead she does marketing and communications to grow the Tradeoffs listener and readership. Prior to joining the team, she worked in science communications at the University of Pennsylvania. Shannon has been a library assistant and holds a Master’s degree in law. She is a Philadelphia native and in her spare time she loves going to see live music.
Email: scrane@tradeoffs.org
Twitter: @shanoonercrane
Alex Olgin, Reporter/Producer
Alex joined Tradeoffs in 2022 as a Reporter/Producer. She’s covered health care for six years at local public radio stations and most recently for an industry audience at Gist Healthcare team producing their daily podcast. Alex’s public radio experience includes working as the sole reporter in Charleston for South Carolina Public Radio and covering the death penalty trial of the Charleston church shooter. When she’s not at work, you may find Alex on the dance floor as a competitive salsa dancer.
Email: aolgin@tradeoffs.org
Twitter: @Alexolgin
Cate Cahan, Editor
Cate Cahan joined Tradeoffs in 2020 as adjunct audio editor, and now also contributes to the editing team for Tradeoffs Research Corner articles. Previously, she was a news and projects editor with WBEZ, the NPR member station in Chicago, for two decades. She started out in audio as an editorial editor, researching and writing editorials for WBBM, the CBS news station in Chicago. Her family is Cate’s favorite non-editing interest, with trees coming in a close second.
Soleil Shah, MSc, Research Reporter
Soleil joined Tradeoffs at the start of 2023. He authors the Tradeoffs Research Corner, which translates the latest health policy research in an accessible and engaging way. His work has been published in outlets ranging from NEJM and Health Affairs to STAT and Scientific American. He is a soon-to-be graduate of Stanford Medical School and a former Fulbright Scholar and Zetema Project Fellow. He’s also an avid reader—especially fond of investigative journalism—and is always up for some pickup basketball with his coworkers.
Twitter: @Soleil_Shah
Our BOARD & ADVISORS
Governing Board
Senior Counsel, Berger Montague; Novelist
Former Media Relations Manager, Urban Institute (Ret.)
Founder and Executive Editor, Tradeoffs
Independent Media Strategist
Senior Adviser, Waxman Strategies; Founder, Open Way Coaching
Executive Director, Tradeoffs
Senior Strategist, California Health Care Foundation
Advisory Board
Dean and the Emmett Dedmon Professor, University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy
Henry and Allison McCance Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School; Malcolm Wiener Professor of Social Policy and Director of Health Policy Research, Harvard Kennedy School of Government
Associate Professor of Health Policy, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine
Associate Professor and Chair, Economics Department, University of Louisville
Professor, Department of Family Medicine, Director of the Center for Health Workforce Studies, University of Washington School of Medicine
Catherine C. Henson Professor of Law; Director, Center for Law, Health & Society, Georgia State University
Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law; Associate Director, UCLA Center for Law and Economics
Associate Director, Center for Community and Population Health, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine; Director, Center for Public Health Initiatives, University of Pennsylvania
Assistant Professor, Department of Health Policy and Management, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Associate Professor, Department of Health Care Policy, Harvard Medical School
Associate Professor in the Division of Health Policy and Management, University of Minnesota School of Public Health
Helen Ross Professor, University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration
Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Health Economics, Bloomberg School of Public Health and Carey Business School
Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Economics, Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy, University of Virginia
Assistant Professor, New York University Rory Meyers College of Nursing
Assistant Professor of Medical Ethics and Health Policy, Assistant Professor of Medicine; University of Pennsylvania
Executive Director, Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics; Professor of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine; Robert D. Eilers Professor of Health Care Management, The Wharton School; and practicing physician at the Philadelphia VA
Assistant Professor of Economics and Public Service, New York University
EDITORIAL INDEPENDENCE POLICY
We subscribe to standards of editorial independence adopted by the Institute for Nonprofit News:
Our organization retains full authority over editorial content to protect the best journalistic and business interests of our organization. We maintain a firewall between news coverage decisions and sources of all revenue. Acceptance of financial support does not constitute implied or actual endorsement of donors or their products, services or opinions.
We accept gifts, grants and sponsorships from individuals and organizations for the general support of our activities, but our news judgments are made independently and not on the basis of donor support.
Our organization may consider donations to support the coverage of particular topics, but our organization maintains editorial control of the coverage. We will cede no right of review or influence of editorial content, nor of unauthorized distribution of editorial content.
Our organization will make public all donors who give a total of $5,000 or more per year. We will accept anonymous donations for general support only if it is clear that sufficient safeguards have been put into place that the expenditure of that donation is made independently by our organization and in compliance with INN’s Membership Standards.
Our Supporters
