James Bessen | |
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Born | 1950 |
Occupation(s) | Executive Director of the Technology & Policy Research Initiative, Lecturer |
Employer | Boston University School of Law |
James Bessen (born 1950) is an economist who has been a lecturer at Boston University School of Law since 2004,. [1] He is presently best known for his data-led research concerning software and innovation. [2] He has also demonstrated the diverse impacts of automation on employment and wages. [3] In more recent work, he has established links between investment in software and market dominance in a number of sectors. [4] Before entering academia professionally, Bessen was previously a software developer and CEO of Bestinfo, a software company. [5] Bessen was also a Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. [6]
Bessen researches the economics of innovation, including patents and economic history. He has written about software patents with Eric Maskin, arguing that they might inhibit innovation rather than stimulate progress. [7] With Michael J. Meurer, he wrote Patent Failure: How Judges, Bureaucrats, and Lawyers Put Innovators at Risk [8] as well as papers on patent trolls. [9] His book Learning by Doing: The Real Connection Between Innovation, Wages, and Wealth [10] argues that major new technologies require new skills and knowledge that are slow and difficult to develop, affecting jobs and wages.
Bessen developed the first WYSIWYG desktop publishing program at a community newspaper in Philadelphia in 1983. [11] He established and ran a company, Bestinfo, to sell that program commercially. In 1993, Bestinfo was sold to Intergraph. [12]
He graduated from Harvard University in 1972. [13]