Background
SPENCE, Andrew Michael was born in 1943 in Montclair, New Jersey, United States of America.
SPENCE, Andrew Michael was born in 1943 in Montclair, New Jersey, United States of America.
Bachelor of Arts (Philosophy) Princeton University, 1966. Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts (Mathematics) Oxford University, 1968. Doctor of Philosophy Harvard University, 1972.
Assistant Professor, Harvard University,
3. Association Professor, Stanford University,
5. Honorary Research Fellow, Harvard University, 1975-1976.
Visiting Professor, Harvard University, 1976-1977. George Gund Professor Economics and Business Administration, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States of America, since 1977. Editorial Board, American Economic Review, Bell Journal of Economics, Journal of Economic Theory, and Public Policy.
(Book by Spence, A. Michael)
My first interest developed during a faculty seminar on the economics of discrimination. A subject which seemed tangentially related at the time was the informational structure of markets, and after thinking about the subject for a while, I decided I didn’t know what in principle would constitute a signal that could, in an equilibrium appropriately defined, persistently carry information. The result was a class of models called ‘signalling models’.
They turned out to have rather interesting properties. Without ever really moving on, I added product differentiation and monopolistic competition, the theory (not new) of how (and with what welfare results) markets select products. I then turned to a broad group of subjects that fall under the heading of dynamic aspects of competition.
That interest really developed as a result of dissatisfaction with models (including my own) of entry and entry deterrence. The dynamics of the competitive process with special emphasis on the underlying structure that influences the process has occupied me for the past four or five years.