Laurence Ales
Associate Professor | Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA, UNITED STATES
Laurence Ales' research interests include macroeconomics, optimal taxation, and contract theory.
Biography
Laurence Ales' research focuses on the study of inequality and the design of tax policy. His recent work studies the impact that future disruptive technologies will have on labor markets and determines the best response of policy makers. His work also explores optimal taxation, especially of the very wealthy.
Areas of Expertise (7)
Disruptive Technologies
Tax Policy
Economics
Optimal Taxation
Macroeconomics
Contract Theory
Labor Markets
Media Appearances (4)
Why can’t the Fed just burn some money to stop inflation?
Marketplace.org online
2022-09-23
The Fed can get money back in two ways, said Laurence Ales, an associate professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University. One is by selling you something, like Treasuries. These are loans that you are making to the government in return for interest payments.
Five industries affected by automation right now
Yahoo Finance online
2021-09-17
Amazon’s huge scale makes robotics a tempting proposition. “We find that large firms are more likely to automate low- to middle-skill tasks. The reason for this is that a large retailer such as Amazon can keep a machine busy and use it to its full potential, something that a smaller retailer cannot,” explains Laurence Ales, associate professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University's Tepper School of Business.
Time for Tax Cuts? ‘Trickle-down Economics’ Vs. ‘spillover Effects’
American Enterprise Institute online
2017-01-03
One perspective can found over at the American Economic Association blog where Chris Fleisher features a Q&A with Carrnegie Mellon University economists Laurence Ales and Christopher Sleet. Their recent American Economic Review paper argues that the the marginal tax rate on top earning CEOs should be closer to 20% vs. the current top tax rate of 40%.
Student Studies State Pandemic Policies, Consumer Behaviors
Carnegie Mellon University News online
2020-09-03
Laurence Ales, an associate professor of economics and director of Undergraduate Research in Economics, is advising Xu. Last summer Xu worked with Ales through the Summer Undergraduate Research Apprenticeship program where he helped translate Chinese regional economic data to U.S. standards.
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Industry Expertise (3)
Research
Education/Learning
Writing and Editing
Accomplishments (3)
Christopher Freeman and Richard R. Nelson Prize (professional)
2023
Richard M. Cyert Award for Excellence in Teaching (professional)
2023 Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University
Favorite MBA Professors Of The Class Of 2021 (professional)
2021 Poets & Quants
Education (3)
University of Minnesota: Ph.D., Economics 2008
University of Minnesota: M.S., Economics 2007
University of Rome – Tor Vergata: B.S., Physics 2002
Affiliations (2)
- Macroeconomic Dynamics : Associate Editor
- Carnegie-Rochester-NYU Conference on Public Policy : Advisory Board Member
Links (4)
Languages (2)
- English
- Italian
Event Appearances (3)
How It’s Made: A General Theory of the Labor Implications of Technological Change
2020 US Census
How It’s Made: A General Theory of the Labor Implications of Technological Change
2021 SED Minneapolis, MN
Optimal Taxation of Income-Generating Choice
2020 Econometric Society World Congress Zoom
Articles (5)
Optimal Taxation of Income-Generating Choice
Econometrica2022 Discrete location, occupation, skill, and hours choices of workers underpin their incomes. This paper analyzes the optimal taxation of discrete income-generating choice. It derives optimal tax equations and Pareto test inequalities for mixed logit choice environments that can accommodate discrete and unstructured choice sets, rich preference heterogeneity, and complex aggregate cross-substitution patterns between choices.
Innovation Tournaments with Multiple Contributors
Production and Operations Management2020 This study examines innovation tournaments in which an organizer seeks solutions to an innovation-related problem from a number of agents. Agents exert effort to improve their solutions but face uncertainty about their solution performance. The organizer is interested in obtaining multiple solutions—agents whose solutions contribute to the organizer’s utility are called contributors.
Innovation and Crowdsourcing Contests
Sharing Economy2019 In an innovation contest, an organizer seeks solutions to an innovation-related problem from a group of independent agents. Agents, who can be heterogeneous in their ability levels, exert efforts to improve their solutions, and their solution qualities are uncertain due to the innovation and evaluation processes.
Optimal Award Scheme in Innovation Tournaments
Operations Research2017 In an innovation tournament, an organizer solicits innovative ideas from a number of independent agents. Agents exert effort to develop their solutions, but their outcomes are unknown due to technical uncertainty and/or subjective evaluation criteria. To incentivize agents to make their best effort, the organizer needs to devise a proper award scheme.
Taxing Top CEO Incomes
American Economic Review2016 We use a firm-CEO assignment framework to model the market for CEO effective labor. In the model's equilibrium, more talented CEOs match with and supply more effort to larger firms. Taxation of CEO incomes affects the equilibrium pricing of CEO effective labor and, hence, spills over and affects firm profits.
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