Seminar Series Calendar Archive

The Bureau of Economics periodically hosts seminars given by scholars and practitioners in economic fields related the Federal Trade Commission's missions.  Listed here are the presenters and topics from previous seminar series.  To view the schedule for the current seminar series, go to the seminar series homepage.

Fall 2007

Date

Speaker/Paper/Host

Sept. 6 Michael Baye
(FTC and Indiana)
“Clicks, Discontinuities, and Firm Demand Online”
Sept. 13 John Rust
(University of Maryland)
“Pricing and Selling Decisions by Rental Car Companies”
Sept. 20 Ana Aizcorbe
(Bureau of Economic Analysis)
“Intermittent Purchases and Welfare-Based Price Deflators for Durable Goods”
Seminar will be held in room 4100.
Oct. 4 David Prentice
(LaTrobe and Lehigh)
"The origins of American industrial success:  Evidence from the US portland cement industry."
Oct. 11 Sean Nicholson
(Cornell University)
"Is Early Childhood Television Viewing an Environmental Trigger for Autism?"
Seminar will be held in room 4100.
Oct. 18 Brian Krauth
(Simon Fraser University)
"Bounding a linear causal effect using relative correlation restrictions."
Oct. 25 Jeremy Fox
(University of Chicago)
“Measuring the Efficiency of an FCC Spectrum Auction.”
Nov. 1 Jacques Cremer
“The Value of Switching Costs”
Seminar will be held in room 4100.
Nov. 15 Matt Shum
(Johns Hopkins University)
"Estimating First-Price Auctions with Unknown Number of Bidders: A misclassification approach" (with Yingyao Hu)
Nov. 29 Oz Shy
“Market Dominance and Behavior-Based Pricing Under Horizontal and Vertical Differentiation.”
Dec. 6 Gautam Gowrisankaran
(University of Arizona)
“Dynamics of Consumer Demand for New Durable Goods”
Seminar will be held in room 4100.
Dec. 13 Kathy Zeiler
(Georgetown Law)
Seminar will be held in room 4100.

Unless otherwise noted, all seminars will take place on Thursdays at 2:30pm in the ground floor Conference Center located at 601 New Jersey Ave. NW. No prior security clearance is necessary except for the seminars held in room 4100. Address inquiries to Chris Adams (CADAMS@ftc.gov) or Tammy John (tjohn@ftc.gov).

Updated: July 03, 2007


Click on the lecture title to view an Acrobat PDF copy of the presented paper.
Previous seminar series calendars are available.

Spring 2007

Date

Speaker/Paper/Host

Jan. 18 Avi Goldfarb
(University of Toronto Rotman School of Business)
Geography and Electronic Commerce: Measuring Convenience, Selection, and Price (with Chris Forman and Anindya Ghose)
Feb. 8 Elizabeth Kiser and Ron Borzekowski
(Federal Reserve Board of Governors)
The Choice at the Check Out: Quantifying demand across payment instruments
Feb. 15 Victor Aguirregabiria
(University of Toronto)
Dynamic Spatial Competition between Multi-Store Firms (with Gustavo Vicentini)
Mar. 8 Aviv Nevo
(Northwestern)
Intermediation in Real Estate Markets: Evidence from Fsbomadison.com (with Igal Hendel and Francois Ortalo-Magne)
Notes: In rm NJ 4100
Mar. 15 Michael Nicholson
(Transylvania University)
Technical Assistance for Law and Economics: An empirical analysis in antitrust/competition policy. (with Daniel Sokol and Kyle Stiegert)
Notes: In rm NJ 4100
Mar. 22 Justin Wolfers
(U Penn Wharton)
Financial Markets and Politics: Evidence from Prediction Markets (with Erik Snowberg Eric Zitzewitz)
[PDF 1] [PDF 2 ]
Apr. 16 Ali Hortacsu
(Chicago)
What Makes You Click? Mate Preferences and Matching Outcomes in Online Dating (with Guenter Hitsch and Dan Ariely)
Apr. 26
CANCELED
Steve Berry
(Yale)
Horizontal and Vertical Product Variety in Radio Broadcasting (with Joel Waldfogel)
May 11 Chuck Thomas
(Clemson)
Horizontal Product Differentiation in Auction and Multilateral Negotiations (with Bart J. Wilson)
May 17 Michelle Goeree
(Claremont McKenna)
Was Mr. Hewlett Right? Mergers, Advertising, and the PC Industry
May 31 Brendan Cunningham
(Naval Academy and FTC)
Direct-to-Consumer Advertising Exposure and the Demand for Drugs

Unless otherwise noted, all seminars will take place on Thursdays at 2:30pm in the ground floor Conference Center located at 601 New Jersey Ave. NW. No prior security clearance is necessary except for the seminars held in room 4100. Address inquiries to Chris Adams (CADAMS@ftc.gov) or Tammy John (tjohn@ftc.gov).

Updated: January 12, 2007


Click on the lecture title to view an Acrobat PDF copy of the presented paper.
Previous seminar series calendars are available.

Fall 2006

Date

Speaker/Paper/Host

Sept. 14
Michael Salinger
(FTC)
The Role of Cost in Determining When Firms Offer Bundles (with D. Evans)
Sept. 28
Stan Liebowitz
(Texas,Dallas)
The Effect of Radio Play on Record Sales
Oct. 5 Judith Chevalier
(Yale)
State Casket Sales Restrictions: A Pointless Undertaking? (with Fiona Scott Morton)
Oct. 12
Gary Fournier
(Florida State)
What does Willingness-to-Pay reveal about hospital market power in merger cases?
Oct. 17
(Tues.)
James Eales
(Purdue)
Demand Elasticities for Fresh Fruit at the Retail Level (with C. Durham)
Oct. 26
David Warsh
(Economic Principals)
Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations
Nov. 2
Matt Lewis
(Ohio State)
Temporary Wholesale Gasoline Price Spikes have Long-lasting Retail Effects: The Aftermath of Hurricane Rita
Nov. 9
Room 4100
Christopher R. Knittel (California, Davis)
Strategic Incompatibility in ATM Markets (with Victor Stango of The Tuck School)
Nov. 13
(Mon.)
James C. Miller III
(Chairman, Board of Governors USPS )
TBA
Nov. 16
Pai-Ling Yin
(Harvard Business School)
Economic and Technical Drivers of Technology Choice: Browsers. (with Timothy F. Bresnahan)
Dec. 1
(Fri.)
Nicholas Souleles
(Wharton)
Do Consumers Choose the Right Credit Contracts? (with S. Agarwal, S. Chomsisengphet, and C. Liu)
Dec. 6
(Wed.)
Erich J. Muehlegger
(Harvard)
Measuring Illegal Activity and the Effect of Regulatory Innovation: A Study of Diesel Fuel Tax Evasion

Winter/Spring 2006

Date

Speaker/Paper/Host

Jan. 19
Mark Nadel
(FCC)
How the Standard Residential Real Estate Broker Commission Rate Structure Costs Home Buyers & Sellers Billions
Feb. 16
Mark Skidmore
(Wisconsin-Whitewater)
Do State Motor Fuel Sales-below-cost Laws Lower Prices? (with James Peltier and James Alm)
March 8
(Wed.)
Adam Copeland
(Federal Reserve)
Prices, Production and Inventories over the Automotive Model Year
(with Wendy Dunn and George Hall)
April 6
Chris Dellarocas
(Maryland)
The Sound of Silence in Online Feedback: Estimating Trading Risks in the Presence of Reporting Bias (with C. Wood)
April 13
Cancelled
Andrew Fallow
(Oxford)
The G8's Vaccine Development Plan: Will it work?
April 27
Cancelled
Ginger Jin
(Maryland)
Direct to Consumer Advertising and Prescription Choice (with T. Iizuka)
May 4
Shane Frederick
(MIT)
Cognitive Reflection and Decision Making
May 18
Cancelled
Debra Holt
(FTC)
Television Advertising: Content and Exposure
May 25
Jonathan Zinman
(Dartmouth)
What Monthly Payment Gets You in This Car: Payment/Interest Bias and the Market for Consumer Loans (with Victor Stango)
June 8
Leslie Marx
(FCC/Duke)
Quantitative Analysis of Coordinated Effects
with Bill Kovacic, Bob Marshall, and Steve Schulenberg
June 15 Tim Brennan
(UMBC/ Canadian Competition Bureau)
Three 'mini' essays on bundling
New Jersey Ave. - Room 4100
June 27
J. Stephen Clark
(Nova Scotia Agricultural College),
Will Fat Taxes Cause Americans to Become Fatter? Some Evidence From US Meats
(with J. Levedahl)
July 13
Marc Rysman
(Boston University)
Patents and Performance of Voluntary Standard Setting Organizations
(with Tim Simcoe)

Click on the lecture title to view an Acrobat PDF copy of the presented paper.
More seminars are to be announced in upcoming weeks.

Seminar Series - Fall 2005

Seminar Series - Fall 2005
Date

Speaker/Paper

Sept 21

Yossi Spiegel (Tel-Aviv University)
Partial Cross Ownership and Tacit Collusion

Oct. 6 Chad Syverson (Chicago)
Market Distortions when Agents are Better Informed:
The Value of Information in Real Estate Transactions
(with S. Levitt)

Nov. 3*

Charles Manski (Northwestern) Room 4100
Interpreting the Predictions of Prediction Markets

Nov. 10

Susan Athey (Stanford)
TBA

Nov. 17*

Jesse Shapiro (Chicago) Room 4100
Fooling Some of the People Some of the Time: Advertising and Limited Memory.

Dec. 1

Jonathan Zinman (Dartmouth)
What’s Psychology Worth? A Field Experiment in the Consumer Credit Market (with M. Bertrand, D. Karlan, S. Mullainathan and E.Shafir )

Dec. 8

Andrew Sweeting (Northwestern)
Uniting and Turning the Guns on the Enemy: A Micro Study of Station Ownership, Programming and Listenership in the Music Radio Industry

Dec. 15

Amil Petrin (Chicago)
Omitted Product Attributes in Differentiated Product Models

Unless otherwise noted, all seminars will take place on Thursdays at 2:30pm in the ground floor Conference Center located at 601 New Jersey Ave. NW No prior security clearance is necessary.

*/ Seminar will take place in Room 4100 of the 601 New Jersey Ave. building. Please call or email ahead for security clearance. Contacts: Bernadette Harmon 202 326-3449 bharmon@ftc.gov
Joe Mulholland 202 326-3378 jmulholland@ftc.gov

Seminar Series - Fall 2005
Date

Speaker/Paper

Sept 21

Yossi Spiegel (Tel-Aviv University)
Partial Cross Ownership and Tacit Collusion

Oct. 6 Chad Syverson (Chicago)
Market Distortions when Agents are Better Informed:
The Value of Information in Real Estate Transactions
(with S. Levitt)

Nov. 3*

Charles Manski (Northwestern) Room 4100
Interpreting the Predictions of Prediction Markets

Nov. 10

Susan Athey (Stanford)
TBA

Nov. 17*

Jesse Shapiro (Chicago) Room 4100
Fooling Some of the People Some of the Time: Advertising and Limited Memory.

Dec. 1

Jonathan Zinman (Dartmouth)
What’s Psychology Worth? A Field Experiment in the Consumer Credit Market (with M. Bertrand, D. Karlan, S. Mullainathan and E.Shafir )

Dec. 8

Andrew Sweeting (Northwestern)
Uniting and Turning the Guns on the Enemy: A Micro Study of Station Ownership, Programming and Listenership in the Music Radio Industry

Dec. 15

Amil Petrin (Chicago)
Omitted Product Attributes in Differentiated Product Models

Date

Speaker/Paper

Sept 21
Yossi Spiegel
(Tel-Aviv University)
Partial Cross Ownership and Tacit Collusion
Oct. 6
Chad Syverson
(Chicago)
Market Distortions when Agents are Better Informed: The Value of Information in Real Estate Transactions (with S. Levitt)
Nov. 3* Charles Manski
(Northwestern) Room 4100
Interpreting the Predictions of Prediction Markets
Nov. 10
Susan Athey
(Stanford)
TBA
Nov. 17* Jesse Shapiro
(Chicago) Room 4100
Fooling Some of the People Some of the Time: Advertising and Limited Memory.
Dec. 1
Jonathan Zinman
(Dartmouth)
What’s Psychology Worth? A Field Experiment in the Consumer Credit Market (with M. Bertrand, D. Karlan, S. Mullainathan and E.Shafir )
Dec. 8 Andrew Sweeting
(Northwestern)
Uniting and Turning the Guns on the Enemy: A Micro Study of Station Ownership, Programming and Listenership in the Music Radio Industry
Dec. 15 Amil Petrin
(Chicago)
Omitted Product Attributes in Differentiated Product Models

Unless otherwise noted, all seminars will take place on Thursdays at 2:30pm in the ground floor Conference Center located at 601 New Jersey Ave. NW No prior security clearance is necessary.

*/ Seminar will take place in Room 4100 of the 601 New Jersey Ave. building. Please call or email ahead for security clearance. Contacts: Bernadette Harmon 202 326-3449 bharmon@ftc.gov
Joe Mulholland 202 326-3378 jmulholland@ftc.gov

Seminar Series - Winter/Spring 2005

Date

Speaker/Paper

Jan. 27
Leemore S. Dafny
(Northwestern)
Estimation and Identification of Merger Effects: An Application to Hospital Mergers
Feb. 10
Greg Elliehausen
(Georgetown)
Mortgage Brokers and the Subprime Mortgage Market
March 3 Andrew N. Kleit and James D. Reitzes
(Penn State/The Brattle Group)
Geographic Integration, Transmission Constraints, and Electricity Restructuring
March 17
John Asker
(NYU Stern)
Diagnosing Foreclosure Due to Exclusive Dealing
March 24
Mark Duggan
(Maryland)
The Distortionary Effects Of Government Procurement: Evidence from Medicaid Prescription Drug Purchasing (with Fiona Scott Morton)
Seminar will be in NJ 4100
March 31
3pm
Eric Posner
(Chicago Law)
Holding Internet Service Providers Accountable (with Douglas Lichtman)
April 14 Carl Shapiro
(California Berkeley)
How Strong Are Weak Patents (with Joe Farrell)
April 21 Alan Mathios
(Cornell)
Regulating Advertisements: The Case of Smoking Cessation Products
April 29
Friday
Gregory Duncan
(U.C. Berkeley)
Unbiased Simulators For Analytic Functions and Maximum Unbiased Liklihood Estimation
Seminar will be in NJ 4100
May 5 Marcus Asplund
(Columbia)
Pricing for Long-Run Profits: The Swedish Tobacco Monopoly 1916-1959
May 12 Florian Zettelmeyer
(California Berkeley)
$1000 Cash Back: Asymmetric Information in Auto Manufacturer Promotions
May 20
2pm
Michael Smith
(Carnegie Mellon)
Interest-Based Self-Organizing Peer-to-Peer Networks: A Club Economics Approach
Seminar will be in NJ 4100 Conference Room B
May 26 Robert McMillan
(FTC)
Different Flavor, Same Price: The Puzzle of Uniform Pricing for Differentiated Products
June 15
12pm
Morris Kleiner
(University of Minnesota)
Regulating Occupations: Does Occupational Licensing Increase Earnings and Reduce Employment Growth?
Seminar will be in NJ 4100

Seminar Series - Fall 2004

Seminar Series - Fall 2004
Date

Speaker/Paper

Oct. 7
Jean-pierre H. Dube
(Chicago)
An Empirical Model of Advertising Dynamics. (with H.. Hitsch, P. Manchanda)
Oct. 14
Emek Basker
(Missouri)
Selling a Cheaper Mousetrap: Entry and Competition in the Retail Sector
Oct. 27
(Wed.)
Brian Knight
(Brown)
Are Policy Platforms Capitalized into Equity Prices? Evidence from the Bush/Gore 2000 Presidential Election
Nov. 4
Raphael Thomadsen
(Columbia)
The Impact of Location on Prices: An Analysis in the Fast Food Industry
Nov. 17
(Wed.)
John Yun
(FTC)
Properties of Retail Product and Promotional Distribution (with Steven Tenn)
Dec. 1
(Wed.)
Eric Johnson
(Columbia)
Defaults, Framing and Privacy: Why Opting In Opting Out
Dec. 9 Francine Lafontaine
( Michigan )
Beyond Entry: Examining McDonald's Expansion in International Markets
Dec. 16
Note New Time: 2:00pm
David Laibson
(Harvard)
Shrouded Attributes and Information Suppression in Competitive Markets (with Xavier Gabaix)
Seminar will be in NJ 4100
Seminar Series - Spring 2004

Seminar Series - Spring 2004

Date

Speaker/Title

Jan. 29
Luke Froeb and Steven Tenn
(FTC)
Merger Effects when Firms Compete on Price and Advertising (with Steven Tschantz)
Feb. 5
Serge Moresi and Steve Salop
(Charles Rivers Associates/Georgetown Law)
Collusive Price Leadership by a Dominant Firm - Link to Seminar Slide Presentation
Feb. 26
Volker Nocke
(Wharton)
Do Vertical Mergers Facilitate Upstream Collusion? (with Lucy White)
March 18
Il-Horn Hann
(USC)
The Value of Online Information Privacy: An Empirical Investigation (with Kai-Lung Hui, Tom S. Lee, and I.P.L. Png)
March 25
Sean Nicholson
(Wharton)
Mergers and Acquisitions in the Pharmaceutical and Biotech Industries (with Patricia Danzon and Andrew Epstein)
April 8
Paul Seabright
(Université de Toulouse)
A minimum of rivalry: evidence from transition economies on the importance of competition for innovation and growth
April 22
Josh Lerner
(Harvard)
Cooperative Marketing Agreements Between Competitors: Evidence from Patent Pools” (with Marcin Strojwas and Jean Tirole)
Cancelled
John Cawley
(Cornell)
Obesity as a Barrier to the Transition from Welfare to Work (with Sheldon Danziger)
May 6
Chris Adams
(FTC)
Digital Demand: Demand for Digital Cameras on eBay (with William Vogt)
May 12
(Wed.)
Patrick Bajari
(Duke)
Economic Insights from Internet Auctions: A Survey (with Ali Hortacsu)
Slides From Presentation
May 20
(Thurs.)
A. Mitchell Polinsky
(Stanford Law)
Remedies for Price Overcharges: The Deadweight Loss of Coupons and Discounts (with D. Rubinfeld)
June 10
Marshall van Alstyne
(Michigan)
Information Asymmetry and Thwarting Spam (with T.Loder and R. Wash)
June 17
Note New Time: 1:30
Cass Sunstein
(Chicago)
Debiasing Through Law (with Christine Jolls)
June 24
Haj Hadeishi and Dave Schmidt
(FTC)
"An Empirical Analysis of a Merger of Manufacturers of Complementary (?) Goods",
Note: Seminar will be in NJ 4100
July 2
Note New Time: 12:00pm
Glenn Woroch
(Berkeley)
Who Signed Up for the Do-Not-Call List? (with Hal Varian and Fredrik Wallenberg)

Seminar Series - Fall 2003

Date

Speaker/Title

Oct. 2
(Thur.)
Bart Wilson
(George Mason)
Experimental Gasoline Markets (with Cary Deck)
Oct. 30
Resnick Seminar Cancelled
Nov. 6
(Thur. at 1:30)
Nicholas Economides
(NYU)
Competition Policy In Network Industries: An Introduction
Nov. 13
(Thur. at 3:00)
Peter Grajzl and Peter Murrell
(Maryland)
Professions, Politicians, and Institutional Reforms
Nov. 20
(Thur.)
Abe Wickelgren
(FTC)
Media Mergers and the Ideological Content of Programming (with Dave Balan and Pat de Graba)
Nov. 24
(Mon.)
Kyle Bagwell
(Columbia)
Collusion with Persistent Cost Shocks (with Susan Athey)
Dec. 1
(Mon.)
Michael Whinston
Antitrust in Innovative Industries (with Ilya Segal)
Dec. 5
(Fri.)
Jeff Perloff
(Berkeley)
Welfare, Market Power, and Price Effects of Product Diversity: Canned Juices(with Michael Ward) - Presentation slides available

Seminar Series - Winter/Spring 2003

Date

Speaker/Title

Thursday,
January 9
Dan Kessler 
(Wharton)
"Is More Information Better?  The Effects of 'Report Cards' on Health Care Providers"  (with David Dranove, Mark McClellan, and Mark Satterthwaite) [PDF 278K]
Thursday,
January 16
William Vogt and Hao Xu 
(FTC/Carnegie Mellon)
"Optimal Bidding in Sequential Online Auctions" (with Ashish Arora and Rema Padman) [PDF 140K]
Thursday,
January 23
12:30 p.m.
Daniel Rubinfeld
(Berkeley)
"Aligning the Interests of Lawyers and Clients" (with A. Mitchell Polinsky)
Thursday,
February 13
Mark Manuszak
(Carnegie Mellon)
"The Impact of Upstream Mergers on Retail Gasoline Markets"
Tuesday,
March 25
M. Christopher Auld
(University of Calgary)
Causal Effect of Early Initiation on Adolescent Smoking Patterns
Wednesday,
April 2
Igal Hendel
(Wisconsin)
"Sales and Consumer Inventory" (with Avi Nevo)
Thursday,
April 10
Erik Hurst
(Chicago)
"Grasshoppers, Ants and Pre-Retirement Wealth:  A Test of Permanent Income Consumers"
Monday,
April 14
Jeremy Bulow
(Stanford)
"Matching and Price Competition" (with Jonathan Levin)
Thursday,
May 1
Dick Wittink
(Yale)
"Flexible Decompositions of Unit-sales Price Promotion Effects Based on Store Scanner Data"
Thursday,
May 22
Sofia Berto Villas-Boas
(Berkeley)
"Vertical Contracts Between Manufacturers and Retailers:  An Empirical Analysis"
Thursday,
May 29
Michelle White
(Cal-San Diego)
"Explaining the Flood of Asbestos Litigation:  Consolidation, Bifurcation, and Bouquet Trial"

Last Modified: Thursday, 10-Jan-2008 11:59:00 EST