On the eve of the 11th annual D-TEA conference, promoting Dialogues between Theory, Experimental findings and Applications of decision-making (hence the acronym), we talk to its co-organizer Professor Itzhak Gilboa. Last year, the professor of decisions sciences was ranked by Stanford University in the world’s top six theoretical economists. Gilboa’s research centers on decision under uncertainty and decision models whereby uncertainty can’t be quantified. That is called non-Bayesian decision models – as opposed to the Bayesian approach which assigns probabilities based on experience or best guesses. The HEC Paris academic questions these axioms, or self-evident truths. He believes his research can help answer unforeseen crises, called black swans, like the war in Ukraine, health pandemics or the climate crisis. Extracts.
Because of Europe’s strong social welfare tradition, the social dimension of business has an additional legitimacy and urgency here. Top-quality research and teaching have an essential role to play in understanding growing inequalities which hinder the urgently needed ecological transition, in interrogating the environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors, their interplay and their promise and limitations, in leveraging theory and the most ambitious empirical methods. As a leading business school and research center in France and Europe, HEC Paris’ faculty has a responsibility in providing science-based evidence and practical tools to reinvent the business of tomorrow.
Is globalization’s time up? There are two major, and conflicting, views about this tricky topic. For many economists, free trade is a natural state of the global economic system. Any upheavals – Covid-19, the war between Ukraine and Russia, the resurgence of protectionism - can only result in temporary disruptions which, sooner or later, will be corrected. They are just bursts of irrationality, arising momentarily from political forces upsetting otherwise harmonious economic balance, etc.
Top personalities from the political and academic worlds, including Pascal Lamy, Peter Altmaier, John Denton and Merit Janow, were amongst the 17 speakers at a September 29 conference at HEC Paris on constitutionalism. Over three intense sessions, the policymakers and professors of law explored reforms in governance of public goods. In this article, however, our focus was on how innovative research in faculties should and sometimes does lead to concrete policy proposals.
The upswing in inflation figures on both sides of the Atlantic, called “reflation”, continues to worry governments and the public. But what is behind these inflationary pressures? What are the consequences of this 13-year-high in the euro zone (4.1% in October); and 30-year record surge in prices in the United States? To find out what caused these increases and to analyze what could happen in the future, we’ve turn to two HEC academics whose research is linked to the inflation question. Associate Professor Eric Mengus specializes in monetary and macro-economics. His colleague, Associate Professor Gaetano Gaballo, is a researcher in the same domains, and he’s also worked for seven years as a senior economist at the Banque de France. In mid-October, they reflected on a wide range of issues linked to reflation.
The September 26 federal elections in Germany have been earmarked as one of its most important in the past two decades. For a start, it signals the end of Angela Merkel’s tenure as Chancellor, after 16 years at the helm of Europe’s largest economy. To comment on this landmark vote, its uncertain outcome, and economic outlook, we turn to Armin Steinbach, HEC professor in law and economics. Steinbach is ideally placed to comment: prior to his September arrival at our business school, he spent over a decade as a government official and adviser in the Ministries of Finance and of Economic Affairs and Germany’s Parliament.
Jean-Noël Barrot is an associate professor at HEC Paris and member of parliament for Yvelines in France’s National Assembly, combining his political work with his research in finance. On June 29, he submitted a report to the government in which he detailed proposals to help France recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. In this interview, Jean-Noël Barrot explains how he manages to combine his research and his role in parliament in an effective way.
With the gradual end of the pandemic, the price level began to rise in the United States and in the euro zone. Eric Mengus, Associate Professor of Economics at HEC Paris, explains this return to inflation, and whether we should be worried about it.
On March 31, 2021, French President Emmanuel Macron announced a 4-week national lockdown, throwing the country into a similar situation slightly over a year ago. This time though, not all businesses are affected in the same way. On Knowledge@HEC podcast, HEC Paris Associate Professor of Economics Tomasz Michalski analyzes the possible microeconomic impact of the different lockdown strategies, and its eventual long-term effects.
A striking feature of the ongoing COVID-19 crisis is the boom in house prices. Economists are debating on the origins of such a spike. Based on his recent publication coauthored with Boston College Professor Ryan Chahrour, HEC Paris Professor Gaballo explains how housing prices generates waves of optimism and pessimism causing sizeable fluctuations in the business cycle. A spike in housing prices can then effectively fuel the optimism needed to trigger a quick, persistent recovery of the US economy.
