Ph.D. Placement: Moyan Li

Prior to his doctoral studies, Moyan Li received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Economics from Wuhan University. In the summer of 2024, Moyan joined Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou) as an Assistant Professor.

“I extend my heartfelt gratitude to my co-chairs Haizhen Lin, Dan Sacks, George Ball, and my committee members Andrew Butters, RJ Niewoehner, and Krista Li,” says Li. “Their expertise, guidance, and support have been invaluable throughout my journey. I also appreciate my parents for their unwavering love and encouragement.”

Li’s research focuses on innovation and health economics. His research interests include innovation, health economics, and applied microeconomics. His studies estimate causal effects using applied econometric methods, such as instrumental variable strategy, differencesin-differences models, and event study. His projects leverage large-scale and proprietary data, such as government records, nationally representative surveys, vital statistics, and medical device transaction records. He also uses web scraping and natural language processing to construct novel datasets.

During Li’s doctoral study, he has done research on healthcare innovation and public policy with advisors and collaborators from diverse academic disciplines. In one of his papers, using differences-in-differences models and instrumental variable strategy, he finds that corporate venture capital fosters more medical device product approvals. However, corporate venture capital-backed startups experience worse innovation product quality and more adverse events after devices are launched. In another paper, he finds that a $1 increase in teenage cigarette taxes reduces adult smoking and adult mortality by 9% and 4%, respectively. He also finds larger mortality reductions for men and older individuals, and most of the mortality decline comes from diseases linked to the direct, physical effects of smoking.

“I’m excited to explore more about healthcare innovation development and product quality management, and continue to publish rigorous, data-driven studies with real-world impact,” says Li.

During his doctoral program at IU, he had the privilege to independently teach undergraduate Introduction to Managerial Economics and Strategy, virtually during the spring of 2021 and in person during the spring of 2022.

“I regard teaching as an opportunity to build a long-term and constructive effect on students,” says Li, who believes that active engagement is the key to the learning process.

“My students come from diverse backgrounds, and the online environment of the 2021 spring class made it even more challenging,” he says. “I employ various strategies to create an intriguing and inclusive classroom. Besides discussing course-related topics, I extend the lecture materials to frontier academic research and share my experiences as a researcher. I also talk about career plans with students.”

Li appreciates the fact that at the Kelley School of Business, 68% of students in the PhD program are international.

“I’ve been exposed to a wide diversity of nationalities, races, religions, languages, and sexualities,” says Li. “The opportunity to closely interact with people with different perspectives has widely broadened my views. I not only learned how to appreciate the value of diversity but also built my empathy for people who are treated unequally. I look forward to contributing more to equity and diversity, both inside and outside my workplace.”