Biosketch

Ariel Pakes is the Thomas Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics at Harvard University, where he teaches courses in Industrial Organization and Econometrics. Ariel was the Distinguished Fellow of the Industrial Organization in 2007. In 2017 he received the Jean-Jacques Laffont Prize and in 2018 the BBVA Frontiers of Knowledge Award. In 2019 Ariel was appointed a distinguished fellow of the American Economic Association. In 2020 Ariel was selected to be citation laureate of the Web of Science.

Research Interests

Ariel's research has focused on developing methodology that enables empirical analysis of the market responses to environmental and policy changes (e.g. mergers, tari changes, factor price changes...). This includes; i) the estimation of demand systems that are capable of analyzing the impact of these changes on prices and the demand for new products, ii) developing methods capable of assessing the impact of such changes on productivity, and iii) developing models that enables the analssis of the impacts of these changes on investments and hence the evolution of markets over time. This required an the development of certain econometric and theoretical tools. Currently he is working on estimators for problems involving moment inequalities and on empirically useable theoretical and computational tools for analyzing dynamic games. In the past Ariel applied these tools to the analysis of the auto,Ariel?s research has focused on developing methods for empirically analyzing market responses to environmental and policy changes. This includes developing: i) demand systems that are capable of analyzing the impact of environmental changes (e.g. mergers) on prices, ii) methods capable of analyzing the impact of policy changes (e.g. deregulation) on productivity, and iii) models capable of following the impacts of these changes on the evolution of markets over time. He and his co-authors have applied these tools to the analysis of the auto, electricity, health care, and telecommunications equipment industries. Ariel also developed techniques for: analyzing the impacts of privately funded research and development activity, for constructing a more accurate Consumer Price Index, and for analyzing the impact of incentive schemes on the hospital allocations of doctors.

Membership Type

Member

Election Year

2017

Primary Section

Section 54: Economic Sciences