Graduate student, Han Wang, just had his paper “Contracting with Heterogeneous Researchers” accepted by Games and Economic Behavior, the top field journal in game theory.
Han Wang is a sixth-year graduate student in the Department of Economics at The Ohio State University. He joined the department after earning a Bachelor of Arts from Zhongnan University of Economics and Law and a Master of Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In 2019, he was awarded the Distinguished Department of Economics Fellowship.
Han specializes in microeconomic theory, with research interests in information economics and mechanism design. His research tries to understand how researchers are compensated for acquiring information, how different information sources are combined to motivate effort, and how information is used in auctions. His job market paper focuses on designing incentives for researchers. For example, in vaccine development, governments rely on researchers to gather crucial information and may compensate them based either on their experimental design or their results. Previous studies suggest that when only vaccine effectiveness is considered, both payment methods are equivalent. However, Han’s paper shows that this equivalence breaks down when goverments also consider other factors, such as vaccine side effects. He has also developed a related paper on optimal contracts for researchers with investment opportunities. In addition, he is collaborating with Professor Yaron Azrieli on robust contracting and with Professor Dan Levin on all-pay auctions with affiliated values.
Han has presented at various conferences including the Stony Brook International Conference on Game Theory and the Midwest Theory Conference. Alongside his research, Han is teaching assistant for several courses in the department, including Math Camp and the graduate Microeconomics course for first-year PhD students. In recognition of his outstanding teaching, he received the 2023 Departmental Citation for Excellence in Teaching.
