Hal R. Varian

Hal R. Varian

Varian is currently chief economist at Google. Prior to his retirement from Berkeley in 2010, he was Dean of the School of Information and held joint appointments in the Haas School of Business, and the economics department. Varian has taught at MIT, Stanford, Oxford, Michigan and several other universities around the world. He served as a member of the California Council on Science and Technology, 1995-2000. Varian is a fellow of the Guggenheim Foundation, the Econometric Society, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has served as Co-Editor of the American Economic Review, and is currently on the editorial boards of several journals. Varian has published numerous papers in economic theory, industrial organization, public finance, econometrics and information economics. He is the author of two major economics textbooks, which have been translated into 10 languages. His current research is concerned with the economics of information technology. In particular, he is investigating issues of strategic technology management, the economics of intellectual property, and public policy surrounding information technology.