Richard Jay Zeckhauser

Background

Zeckhauser, Richard Jay was born on November 1, 1940 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Son of Julius Nathaniel and Estelle (Borgenicht) Zeckhauser.

Education

Bachelor of Arts, Harvard University, 1962; Doctor of Philosophy, Harvard University, 1969.

Career

Junior fellow Society Fellows, Harvard University, 1965-1968; member of faculty, Harvard University, since 1968; professor political economics Kennedy School, Harvard University, since 1972; now Frank P. Ramsey professor political economy, Harvard University. Board directors Recovery Engineering, Inc., Comm. Group Insurance, Massachusetts.

Founder, board directors Niederhoffer, Cross & Zeckhauser, 1968-1984.

Achievements

• Richard Jay Zeckhauser has been listed as a noteworthy Economist, educator by Marquis Who's Who.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Early Admissions Game: Joining the Elite, with a new chapter

    (Based on the careful examination of more than 500,000 app...)

  • Targeting in Social Programs: Avoiding Bad Bets, Removing Bad Apples

    ( Should chronically disruptive students be allowed to re...)

  • Demographic Dimensions of the New Republic: American Interregional Migration, Vital Statistics and Manumissions 1800-1860

    (This book provides the first comprehensive and consistent...)

  • Principals and Agents: The Structure of Business (Research colloquium)

    ( Eight essays address the inherent problems of the agenc...)

  • A Primer for Policy Analysis

    ( A Primer for Policy Analysis is an overview of economic...)

  • American Society: Public and Private Responsibilities

    (Book by Knowlton, Winthrop, Zeckhauser, Richard J.)

  • American Society - Public and Private Responsibilities
  • { DEMOGRAPHIC DIMENSIONS OF THE NEW REPUBLIC: AMERICAN INTERREGIONAL MIGRATION, VITAL STATISTICS AND MANUMISSIONS 1800-1860 } Zeckhauser, Richard J ( AUTHOR ) Aug-26-2004 Paperback
  • A Primer for Policy Analysis by Edith Stokey, Richard Zeckhauser (1978) Paperback
  • The Early Admissions Game: Joining the Elite, with a new chapter by Avery Christopher Fairbanks Andrew Zeckhauser Richard (2004-12-30) Paperback
  • A Primer for Policy Analysis by Edith Stokey (1978-06-17)

Views

The primary challenge facing our society is how to allocate resources in accordance with the preferences of the citizenry. Unfortunately, centralised decision-making is hopelessly distorted by a political process that encourages individuals to misrepresent their preferences and inevitably favours certain groups over others Thus my conceptual work has tried to discover possibilities for decentralised allocation procedures, particularly when uncertainty and asymmetric information are problems.

This work has naturally focussed on incentives for honest revelation. Welcome results are (1) that paying the expected externality effectively decentralises multi-stage externality and group decision problems under uncertainty, and (2) that a point-votingtype mechanism for public goods can elicit honest preferences and lead to an efficient bundle. Similarly I have shown that involuntary unemployment is a consequence of worker and firm heterogeneity. That groups employing Bayesian decision methods cannot preserve Pareto optimality.

That a fundamental nonconvexity arises if externality leads to shutdown. And that voting mechanisms must be inefficient if intensities of preference matter. Other work has dealt with agency theory, insurance, and populations with heterogeneous risk. I have also been involved in a variety of policy investigations, exploring ways to promote the health of human beings, to help labour markets and financial markets operate more efficiently, and to foster informed and appropriate choices by individuals and government agencies.

Cross-fertilisation between these policy investigations and my conceptual work has been of great value. In considering such topics as risk analysis (life valuation, calibration of probabilities) and the redesign of regulatory processes, I have found uncertainty and decentralisation to be important issues, and a major theme of my current work on human resources and health is the importance of heterogeneity (possibly unobservable) in the population.

Membership

Board directors Commonwealth School. Fellow: American Association for the Advancement of Science, Institute Medicine/NAS, Association Public Policy and Management, Econometric Society.

Interests

• 022 Microeconomic Theory. 026 Economics of Uncertainty and Information. Game Theory and Bargaining Theory.
  
  822 Public Policy; Role of Government.

Connections

Married Nancy Mackell Hoover, September 9, 1967. Children: Bryn Gordon, Benjamin Rennell.

Father:

Julius Nathaniel Zeckhauser

Mother:

Estelle (Borgenicht) Zeckhauser

Spouse:

Nancy Mackell Hoover

child:

Benjamin Rennell Zeckhauser

child:

Bryn Gordon Zeckhauser