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 "excerpt": "Keith Head is a Canadian economist at the University of British Columbia, known for research on the gravity model of trade and foreign direct investment.",
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 "markdown": "# Keith Head\n\n**Keith Head** (Charles Keith Head) is a Canadian-based economist who holds the HSBC Professorship in Asian Commerce at the [University of British Columbia](https://www.edgepedia.org/university-of-british-columbia)'s Sauder School of Business, where he is a Professor in the Strategy and Business Economics Division.<sup>[1](https://www.sauder.ubc.ca/people/keith-head)</sup> His research areas are international trade, multinational enterprises, economic geography, and industrial organization, and he is best known for work on the [gravity model of trade](https://www.edgepedia.org/gravity-model-of-trade) and on the firm-level determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI).<sup>[1](https://www.sauder.ubc.ca/people/keith-head)</sup><sup> • </sup><sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup> In RePEc's all-time ranking of economists he stands at number 376 worldwide, with an average rank score of 426.73 computed as a harmonic mean across criteria that include citation measures.<sup>[3](https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.person.all.html)</sup>\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Position | HSBC Professor in Asian Commerce; Professor, Strategy and Business Economics Division, UBC Sauder<sup>[1](https://www.sauder.ubc.ca/people/keith-head)</sup> |\n| Education | B.A. with High Honors, Swarthmore College (1986); Ph.D., MIT (1991), thesis \"Learning-by-Doing and Infant Industries\" supervised by Paul Krugman<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup> |\n| Signature work | \"Gravity Equations: Workhorse, Toolkit, Cookbook\" with Thierry Mayer, *Handbook of International Economics* Vol. 4 (2014), pp. 131–195<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup> |\n| FDI contribution | Head and Ries (2008) derived a gravity equation for FDI as acquisitions, published in *Journal of International Economics* 74(1), 2–20<sup>[5](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=926133)</sup> |\n| Editorship | Co-editor, *Journal of International Economics*, July 2014 – June 2017; Associate Editor, *Journal of the European Economic Association*, 2024–<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup> |\n| Recent output | \"The Laffer Curve for Rules of Origin\" (*JIE*, July 2024); \"Global giants and local stars\" (*AEJ: Microeconomics*, February 2025)<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup> |\n\n## Career and education\n\nHead earned a B.A. with High Honors in [Economics](https://www.edgepedia.org/economics) at [Swarthmore College](https://www.edgepedia.org/swarthmore-college) in 1986 and a Ph.D. in Economics from MIT in 1991; his thesis, \"Learning-by-Doing and Infant Industries,\" was supervised by [Paul Krugman](https://www.edgepedia.org/paul-krugman).<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup><sup> • </sup><sup>[7](https://cepr.org/about/people/keith-head)</sup>\n\nHis academic career has been spent entirely at the University of British Columbia: Assistant Professor from 1991 to 1998, Associate Professor from 1998 to 2003, and Professor from 2003 onward, in what is now the Sauder School of Business.<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup> He received the Killam Research Prize in 2008 and the Sauder Research Excellence Prize (senior category) in 2013.<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup>\n\n**Editorial and supervisory roles.** He served as Co-editor of the *Journal of International Economics* from July 1, 2014 to June 30, 2017, and became an Associate Editor of the *Journal of the European Economic Association* in 2024.<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup> UBC's Graduate School lists him as a doctoral supervisor in Strategy and Business Economics, with completed dissertations ranging from \"Vertical supply chains and international business\" (2009) to \"Essays on intellectual property and innovation\" (2025); a 2025 dissertation under his supervision found that only 40% of US imports from China originate from Chinese-owned firms located in China, the rest coming from multinational enterprises operating there.<sup>[8](https://grad.ubc.ca/researcher/15212-head)</sup>\n\n## Major research contributions\n\n**The gravity chapter.** Head's most influential single work is \"Gravity Equations: Workhorse, Toolkit, Cookbook,\" written with [Thierry Mayer](https://www.edgepedia.org/thierry-mayer) for the *Handbook of International Economics* (Vol. 4, 2014).<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup> The chapter noted that gravity equations, which relate bilateral trade flows to economic size and distance, had been used as a workhorse for analyzing the determinants of bilateral trade since their introduction by [Jan Tinbergen](https://www.edgepedia.org/jan-tinbergen) in 1962.<sup>[9](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)</sup> The chapter's central methodological argument is that naive estimation of gravity equations leads to biased and frequently misinterpreted results, and it advocates a \"toolkit\" of theory-consistent estimators used in concert rather than any single regression recipe.<sup>[9](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)</sup> It traces three pivotal phases of the gravity literature: 1995, when Trefler's \"missing trade\" and McCallum's border effects exposed the puzzle of home bias; 2002–2004, when multilateral resistance entered through Eaton and Kortum (2002) and Anderson and van Wincoop (2003); and 2008, when gravity converged with the heterogeneous-firms literature of Chaney, Helpman, and co-authors, and Melitz and Ottaviano.<sup>[9](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)</sup> The chapter also records that gravity estimates can now be combined with trade policy experiments to calculate implied welfare changes, turning a descriptive regression into a counterfactual tool.<sup>[9](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)</sup> A companion website distributes the code and data.<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup>\n\n**FDI as acquisitions.** With John Ries, Head built a parallel gravity framework for foreign direct investment. Their model treats FDI as the outcome of a market for corporate control, in which headquarters bid to control overseas assets; the derived equation for bilateral FDI stocks resembles the fixed-effects approach to bilateral trade, and the paper appeared in the *Journal of International Economics* 74(1), 2–20 (January 2008).<sup>[5](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=926133)</sup> The handbook chapter notes that this discrete-choice construction, resembling Eaton and Kortum (2002), fits FDI stock data well.<sup>[9](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)</sup>\n\n**Firm-level and location work.** Head's empirical record on multinationals began early: \"Agglomeration benefits and location choice: Evidence from Japanese manufacturing investments in the United States\" (with Ries and Deborah Swenson, *Journal of International Economics* 38, 1995, pp. 223–247) is among his most-cited papers.<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup><sup> • </sup><sup>[10](https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=Stw75CsAAAAJ)</sup> Related work with Ries on Japanese manufacturers examined the FDI-versus-export decision (2003) and offshore production and skill upgrading (*JIE*, 2002).<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup> A 1996 paper with Ries estimated that China's incentive zones increased foreign investment by 30%, comprising a static increase of 13% and an additional 17% gain through agglomeration.<sup>[11](https://urbaneconomics.org/workshops/summerschool2026/slides/Mayer_UEASS2026.pdf)</sup> Other widely cited papers include \"The puzzling persistence of the distance effect on bilateral trade\" with Anne-Célia Disdier (*Review of Economics and Statistics*, 2008), which showed that the distance effect on trade had not declined as globalization narratives suggested, and \"The erosion of colonial trade linkages after independence\" (*JIE*, 2010), which introduced the \"method of Tetrads\" for estimating bilateral trade equations, a technique other researchers have since adopted.<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup> He also authored the textbook *Elements of Multinational Strategy* (Springer, 2007).<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup>\n\nThe collaboration pairs Head's firm-level FDI agenda, built largely with Ries on Japanese and corporate-control data, with Mayer's spatial and economic-geography emphasis; the gravity chapter and the counterfactual-methods work sit at the intersection.<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup><sup> • </sup><sup>[9](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)</sup>\n\n## By the numbers\n\nRePEc's all-time aggregate ranking places Head at 376 among economists, with an average rank score of 426.73; the score is a harmonic mean of his ranks across multiple criteria, including citation-based measures, so a weak criterion pulls the aggregate down sharply.<sup>[3](https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.person.all.html)</sup> On the h-index criterion specifically, RePEc ranks him 186 with an h-index of 45 as of August 2026, counting citations extracted by the CitEc project from works cataloged in RePEc, where both the cited and citing works must be listed.<sup>[6](https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.person.hindex.html)</sup> An aggregated bibliometric profile reports 123 works and 16,060 citations with an h-index of 42, and attributes 2,325 citations to the gravity handbook chapter, 1,134 to the 1995 agglomeration paper, and 1,096 to the colonial-trade-linkages paper; this profile is a weaker source than RePEc, and the two h-index figures differ because the underlying citation databases differ.<sup>[6](https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.person.hindex.html)</sup>\n\n## Influence on trade policy and practice\n\nSeveral of Head's papers address policy questions directly. \"How remote is the offshoring threat?\" (with Mayer and Ries, *European Economic Review*) examined the political concern over jobs moving abroad; \"Do trade missions increase trade?\" (*Canadian Journal of Economics*, 2010) evaluated a government promotion tool; and \"Regionalism within Multilateralism: The WTO Trade Policy Review of Canada\" (with Ries, *The World Economy*, 2004) engaged the WTO's review process for regional trade agreements.<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup> His gravity-based welfare framework underlies policy counterfactual analysis, and \"The United States of Europe: A Gravity Model Evaluation of the Four Freedoms\" (*Journal of Economic Perspectives*, 2021) applied it to European integration.<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup><sup> • </sup><sup>[9](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)</sup>\n\nHe remains active in current debates through VoxEU columns: \"No, the EU does not impose a 45% tariff on itself\" (with Mayer, November 13, 2025) and \"An alliance for open trade: How to counter Trump's tariffs\" (July 27, 2025).<sup>[7](https://cepr.org/about/people/keith-head)</sup>\n\n## Recent developments\n\nHead's output has continued at a steady pace. \"Poor Substitutes? Counterfactual methods in IO and Trade compared\" (with Mayer) appeared in the *Review of Economics and Statistics* in September 2023.<sup>[2](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)</sup> \"The Laffer Curve for Rules of Origin,\" with Mayer and Marc Melitz, appeared in the *Journal of International Economics* 150 in July 2024, and \"Global giants and local stars: How changes in brand ownership affect competition,\" with Vanessa Alviarez and Mayer, appeared in *American Economic Journal: Microeconomics* 17(1), pp. 389–434, in February 2025.<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup> He also contributed a Springer encyclopedia chapter, \"Paul Krugman (1953–),\" in 2025.<sup>[12](https://ideas.repec.org/h/spr/sprchp/978-3-031-77623-6_32.html)</sup>\n\n**Current projects.** CEPR lists his discussion paper DP21184, \"Industrial policies for multi-stage production: The battle for battery-powered vehicles\" (February 15, 2026), with Mayer and Melitz.<sup>[7](https://cepr.org/about/people/keith-head)</sup> Lecture slides for a 2026 Urban Economics Association summer school present the associated model of multi-stage production location, calibrated to 2022 S&P data covering cell and assembly locations for all electric-vehicle models since 2015; the counterfactual results indicate that a clean, unconditional subsidy would have done more to promote EV adoption than subsidies restricted to particular production locations.<sup>[11](https://urbaneconomics.org/workshops/summerschool2026/slides/Mayer_UEASS2026.pdf)</sup> His 2024 appointment as Associate Editor of the *Journal of the European Economic Association* continues his editorial activity.<sup>[4](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)</sup>\n\n## References\n\n1. [Keith Head, UBC Sauder School of Business faculty page](https://www.sauder.ubc.ca/people/keith-head)\n2. [Publications, Keith Head, UBC](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/publications)\n3. [Top Economists, IDEAS/RePEc (May 2026)](https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.person.all.html)\n4. [Curriculum Vitae, Charles Keith Head (February 18, 2025)](https://blogs.ubc.ca/khead/files/2025/10/cv_head_3p.pdf)\n5. [FDI as an Outcome of the Market for Corporate Control: Theory and Evidence (Head & Ries), SSRN](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=926133)\n6. [Top Economists by h-index, IDEAS/RePEc (August 2026)](https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.person.hindex.html)\n7. [Keith Head, CEPR people profile](https://cepr.org/about/people/keith-head)\n8. [Keith Head, UBC Graduate School supervisor profile](https://grad.ubc.ca/researcher/15212-head)\n9. [Gravity Equations: Workhorse, Toolkit, and Cookbook, CEPII Working Paper 2013-27](https://www.cepii.fr/pdf_pub/wp/2013/wp2013-27.pdf)\n10. [Keith Head, Google Scholar profile](https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=Stw75CsAAAAJ)\n11. [Mayer lecture slides, Urban Economics Association Summer School 2026](https://urbaneconomics.org/workshops/summerschool2026/slides/Mayer_UEASS2026.pdf)\n12. [ideas.repec.org](https://ideas.repec.org/h/spr/sprchp/978-3-031-77623-6_32.html)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Social and behavioral scientists › Macroeconomists and monetary economists › International trade economists*\n\n*Initially written Oct 10, 2026 · Edited: Oct 11, 2026; Oct 15, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n",
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