Prof. Hsieh received his Ph. D. in Economics in 1998 from UC Berkeley, was an Assistant Professor of Economics at Princeton University for five years, and now is an Associate Professor of Economics here at Berkeley teaching Intermediate Macroeconomic Theory, International and Area Studies (IAS) 107.

Some of his most recent working papers are “When Schools Compete, How Do They Compete: An Assessment of Chile's Nationwide School Voucher Program” with Miguel Urquiola, “Can Free Entry be Inefficient? Fixed Commissions and Social Waste in the Real Estate Industry” with Enrico Moretti, and “The Impact of Outsourcing to China on Hong Kong's Labor Market.”

Prof. Hsieh does research on growth and development, which can include topics on institutions in poor countries and factors that might explain low economic performance, or school organizations and the effect on quality.  He has done research on developing countries in Latin American and Asia.  In his field he does more background investigation first to get the big picture of what actually happened in these countries. Research, he says, is a combination of knowing what happened and learning about what other explanations are consistent with the facts.  His research entails trying to find out about policies, thinking about what kinds of data might be useful, and getting the data.  Depending on his questions, his data could from tables in published work, in archives, micro data, or statistical data of industries, which typically is not found online.  He uses his data is to tell a story first and rely less on what other people say.

Prof. Hsieh was very kind and helpful in giving me advice on my topic and how to do research.  I think he would make a good advisor for students studying growth in developing countries.  He’s open to be an advisor this semester and next.