Renmin University | China
Dr. Xiaochen Xie is an Assistant Professor at the School of Finance, Renmin University of China, where he has served since August 2021. He concurrently holds research associate appointments at the China Financial Policy Research Center, the Institute of Public Finance and Taxation, and the Institute of Digital Economics and Taxation at Renmin University. Dr. Xie’s research integrates international trade, industrial organization, public economics, and urban economics, with a strong emphasis on firm dynamics, pricing behavior, trade policy, and market structure in global technology industries. His scholarship particularly addresses the complex interactions between trade liberalization, industrial development, and consumer welfare, often using structural and empirical approaches to uncover mechanisms shaping modern markets. Dr. Xie earned his Ph.D. in Economics from Pennsylvania State University in 2021, where his dissertation, Essays on Firm Entry and Pricing, was supervised by renowned economist Jonathan Eaton. He also holds an M.S. in Economics from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and dual bachelor’s degrees in Finance and Statistics from Peking University. His interdisciplinary training forms the foundation of his analytical approach to understanding global economic phenomena. His research has appeared in leading outlets, including the Journal of Economic Geography, and he maintains an active pipeline of working papers on export dynamics, optimal taxation, industrial policy, and global smartphone markets. Several of his papers are under review or revise-and-resubmit at prestigious journals such as the International Journal of Industrial Organization and the Journal of the European Economic Association. His work has received recognition, including the Outstanding Paper Award at the NCER-CCER Chinese Economy Conference in 2021. A frequent presenter at international conferences, Dr. Xie has delivered research at institutions such as Tsinghua University, Peking University, Fudan University, Zhejiang University, and at major meetings including the European Economic Association and EARIE conferences. He is also an active referee for top scholarly journals. At Renmin University, Dr. Xie teaches public finance, quantitative empirical economics, and structural methods, consistently earning exceptional teaching evaluations. He has secured multiple competitive grants, including NSFC and university-funded projects focused on tariffs, international tax policy, and fiscal capacity. Beyond academia, he previously worked in finance and investment analysis and has served as Vice President at Yuewei Capital. Born in Tianjin in 1992, Dr. Xie is fluent in Chinese and English and enjoys Xiangqi, soccer, and travel.
Featured Publications
Chen, Y., Huang, T., & Xie, X. (2025). Place-based policies: First-mover advantage and persistence. Journal of Economic Geography, lbaf001.
Lu, W., & Xie, X. (2024). Trade, markups, and consumer welfare: Evidence from the global smartphone industry (SSRN Working Paper No. 4804811). SSRN. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4804811
Xie, X. (2021). Two essays on firm entry and pricing (Doctoral dissertation, The Pennsylvania State University).