Shuyang Sheng - University of Southern California

Department of Economics
University of Southern California
3620 S. Vermont Avenue, KAP 300
Los Angeles, CA 90089
Phone: +1 (323) 836-8300
Fax: +1 (213) 740-8543
Email: ssheng@usc.edu
Web: http://www-scf.usc.edu/~ssheng
Ph.D. Economics, University of Southern California, 2007–2013 (expected)
Dissertation Title: “An Econometric Analysis of Network Formation Games”
Advisor: Geert Ridder
Ph.D. student, China Center for Economic Research, Peking University, 2004–2006
M.A. Economics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China, 2003
B.A. Economics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China, 2001
Primary: Econometrics
Secondary: Social Networks, Applied Micro, Development Economics
“Identification and Estimation of Network Formation Games” (Job Market Paper)
“Nonparametric Identification of Social Interactions: Learning from Neighbors”
“A Discrete Mixture Model for Network Formation” with Geert Ridder (work in progress)
2013 North American Winter Meeting of the Econometric Society, San Diego (scheduled)
Econometrics Proseminar, UCLA (scheduled)
2012 The Econometric Society European Meeting, Malaga
North American Summer Meeting of the Econometric Society, Evanston
International Symposium on Econometric Theory and Applications, Shanghai
Econometrics Seminar, USC
2011 California Econometrics Conference, USC
Asian Meeting of the Econometric Society, Seoul
Annual Conference of Western Economic Association International, San Diego
2010 Pacific Conference for Development Economics, USC
Referee: Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, China Economic Quarterly (in
Mandarin)
Editorial Assistant, Economic Development and Cultural Change, 2008–2009
Research Assistant, China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS)-Pilot, CCER,
Peking University, January–June 2007
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Teaching Assistant at USC
Ph.D. Courses
Econometrics Method for Roger Moon Spring 2011
Economic and Financial Time Series I for Hashem Pesaran Spring 2010, 2011
Applied Econometrics for Cheng Hsiao Fall 2010
Undergraduate Courses
Introduction to Econometrics for Cheng Hsiao Fall 2010
Intermediate Macroeconomic Theory for Jeffrey Nugent Spring 2010
Intermediate Microeconomic Theory for Shelkh Shahnawaz Fall 2009
Teaching Assistant at Peking University
Intermediate Microeconomics for Yaohui Zhao Fall 2005
2012 – 2013 Dissertation Completion Fellowship, USC
2012 Gold Family Graduate Fellowship, USC
2011, 2012 Summer Research Fellowship, Department of Economics, USC
2011, 2012 Conference Travel Grant, GPSS, USC
2011 Outstanding TA Award, Department of Economics, USC
2010 Best Third Year Paper Award, Department of Economics, USC
2008 Graduate Student Summer Fieldwork Grant, US-China Institute, USC
2007 – 2012 College Graduate Merit Award, USC
Scientific Workplace, Matlab, Stata, C, Linux
Citizenship: China (F-1 Visa)
Birthday: December 1981
Geert Ridder (Chair)
Professor of Economics
E-mail: ridder@usc.edu
Phone: (213)740-3511
Hyungsik Roger Moon
Professor of Economics
E-mail: moonr@usc.edu
Phone: (213)740-2108
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Cheng Hsiao
Professor of Economics
E-mail: chsiao@usc.edu
Phone: (213)740-2103
John Strauss
Professor of Economics
E-mail: jstrauss@usc.edu
Phone: (213)740-7698

“Identification and Estimation of Network Formation Games” (Job Market Paper)
Social and economic networks play an important role in shaping individual behaviors. In this
paper, we aim to identify and estimate network formation games using observed data on network
structure, i.e., who is linked with whom. We use pairwise stability, introduced by Jackson and
Wolinsky (1996), as the equilibrium condition to map observed networks to model primitives.
Because the fraction of unique equilibria is close to zero, the model is generally not identified. We
leave the equilibrium selection completely unrestricted and resort to partial identification.
Following Ciliberto and Tamer (2009), we derive from the pairwise stability condition bounds on
the probability of observing a network. The moment inequalities obtained from these bounds,
however, are computationally infeasible if networks are large. To proceed, we propose a novel
approach based on subnetworks. A subnetwork is the restriction of a network to a subset of the
individuals. We derive bounds on the probability of observing a subnetwork, considering only the
pairwise stability of the subnetwork. Under a local externality assumption about the utility
function, these new bounds yield moment inequalities that are computationally feasible provided
that we only use small subnetworks. We define the identified set based on the feasible moment
inequalities and discuss how to consistently estimate the identified set and construct a confidence
region. When estimating the distribution of subnetworks, we use graph isomorphism to group the
subnetworks into equivalence classes to avoid the labeling problem and to resolve the
indeterminacy in picking the subnetworks from a network. The bounds are computed by
simulation if they do not have closed forms.
Last updated December 5, 2012
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