About

Kyle Bagwell is the Donald L. Lucas Professor in Economics at Stanford University. His research focuses on International Trade, Industrial Organization, and Game Theory. He examines theoretical and empirical questions related to the purpose and design of GATT/WTO trade agreements, as well as theories of competition and cooperation in settings where asymmetric information is present. His work explores the purpose and design of trade agreements, competition and cooperation under private information, and collusion and advertising.

Research topics

• International trade
• Sociology
• Political Science
• Economics
• International economics
• Law
• Keynesian economics
• Microeconomics

Selected publications

• Monopolistic Competition and Efficiency under Firm Heterogeneity and Nonadditive Preferences

  American Economic Journal Microeconomics · 2023-10-27 · 4 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  We consider the single-sector version of the Melitz-Ottaviano model of monopolistic competition with heterogeneous firms. We characterize the first-best and market allocations. We find that the market provides the first-best level of entry but too little selection; hence, the market provides too many varieties and too little aggregate quantity, and allocates too little (much) production to low (high) cost realizations. Allowing for a broad family of quantity allocation functions, we establish sufficient conditions for the global optimality of the first-best solution. Several important extensions are also examined. (JEL D21, D43, D50, D60)

  PublisherDOI

• Regulating a monopolist with uncertain costs without transfers

  Theoretical Economics · 2022-01-01 · 19 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  We analyze the Baron and Myerson (1982) model of regulation under the restriction that transfers are infeasible. Extending techniques from the delegation literature to incorporate an ex post participation constraint, we report sufficient conditions under which optimal regulation takes the form of price‐cap regulation. We establish conditions under which the optimal price cap is set at a level such that no types are excluded and show that exclusion of higher cost types can be optimal when these conditions fail. We also provide conditions for the optimality of price‐cap regulation when an ex post participation constraint is present and exclusion is infeasible.

  PublisherDOI

• Quantitative Analysis of Multiparty Tariff Negotiations

  Econometrica · 2021-01-01 · 1 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  We develop a model of international tariff negotiations to study the design of the institutional rules of the GATT/WTO. A key principle of the GATT/WTO is its most‐favored‐nation (MFN) requirement of nondiscrimination, a principle that has long been criticized for inviting free‐riding behavior. We embed a multisector model of international trade into a model of interconnected bilateral negotiations over tariffs and assess the value of the MFN principle. Using 1990 trade flows and tariff outcomes from the Uruguay Round of GATT/WTO negotiations, we estimate the model and use it to simulate what would happen if the MFN requirement were abandoned and countries negotiated over discriminatory tariffs. We find that if tariff bargaining in the Uruguay Round had proceeded without the MFN requirement, it would have wiped out the world real income gains that MFN tariff bargaining in the Uruguay Round produced and would have instead led to a small reduction in world real income relative to the 1990 status quo.

  PublisherDOI

• Issue Information

  The RAND Journal of Economics · 2021-03-01

  paratextOpen access

  Rest of World), 452 (Europe), 355 (UK

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Multilateral Trade Bargaining: A First Look at the GATT Bargaining Records

  American Economic Journal Applied Economics · 2020 · 37 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Political Science
  • Economics
  • International trade

  This paper empirically examines recently declassified tariff bargaining data from the GATT/WTO. Focusing on the Torquay Round (1950–1951), we document stylized facts about these interconnected high-stakes international negotiations that suggest a lack of strategic behavior among the participating governments and an important multilateral element to the bilateral bargains. We suggest that these features can be understood as emerging from a tariff bargaining forum that emphasizes the GATT pillars of MFN and multilateral reciprocity, and we offer evidence that the relaxation of strict bilateral reciprocity facilitated by the GATT multilateral bargaining forum was important to the success of the GATT approach. (JEL C78, F13)

  PublisherDOI

• Issue Information

  The RAND Journal of Economics · 2020-06-01

  paratextOpen access

  Identifying productivity when it is a factor of production

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Trade policy under monopolistic competition with firm selection

  Journal of International Economics · 2020 · 58 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Economics
  • International economics
  • Microeconomics
  PublisherDOI

• Erratum to ‘”Trade policy under monopolistic competition with firm selection” [Journal of International Economics 127 (2020) 103379]

  Journal of International Economics · 2020-12-26

  erratum1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• WTR volume 19 issue 4 Cover and Front matter

  World Trade Review · 2020-10-01

  articleOpen access

  An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Money burning in the theory of delegation

  Games and Economic Behavior · 2020-03-23 · 17 citations

  articleSenior authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Robert W. Staiger

  283 shared

• Robert Howse

  New York Law School

  217 shared

• Joseph H. H. Weiler

  208 shared

• Bernice Greenberg

  St. Olaf College

  208 shared

• Jean Chair

  University of Michigan–Ann Arbor

  208 shared

• Henrik Horn

  159 shared

• Gene Grossman Is

  Columbia University

  144 shared

• Robert Staiger Is

  Columbia University

  144 shared