Stanford Professor Susan Athey Will Join The DOJ's Antitrust Division

STANFORD, CA —Stanford professor Susan Athey will be joining the U.S. Department of Justice as the chief economist of the DOJ's antitrust division, the university confirmed Thursday.

Athey is an endowed economics of technology professor in the Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB), the founder and associate director of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI), and was the chief economist at Microsoft Corp. from 2008-13.

Earlier in her career, Athey was a professor of economics and business at MIT and Harvard and she won the John Bates Clark Award in 2007 for her contributions to multiple subfields, including industrial organization, microeconomic theory, and econometrics.

"Susan is a force of nature," said Jonathan Levin, the dean of the Stanford GSB. "She moves from machine learning to business strategy to technology policy to social impact, producing deep ideas at every turn."

The university said Athey will continue her Stanford GSB appointment in a part-time capacity as she steps into her new governmental role.

In her new job with the DOJ, Athey said she will be trying to address the problems of the digital economy from the top down.

"Government laws and policies affect everything from how competition works to what mergers go through, to what investments people make," Athey said.

Athey said she also will be hoping to continue many of Stanford HAI's efforts to help governments adapt to rapidly changing technology, especially around the use of data in business and government.

"Because technology such as artificial intelligence moves so quickly, it's hard for the government to keep up," Athey said. "We have to figure out how all branches of government are going to be prepared to guide us through a different age."