Starr grew up in
Los Angeles where he attended high school. He attended
UCLA and
Reed College before obtaining his
Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from
Stanford in 1966. He completed his
PhD in economics at Stanford in 1972. His dissertation was supervised by
Kenneth Arrow.
Starr first published the
Shapley–Folkman lemma on the existence of quasi-equilibria in economies with non-convexities.
In addition to publications in economic journals, he wrote the textbook General Equilibrium Theory: An Introduction.
Selected publications
Starr, Ross M. (1969), "Quasi-equilibria in markets with non-convex preferences (Appendix 2: The Shapley–Folkman theorem, pp. 35–37)", Econometrica, 37 (1): 25–38,
CiteSeerX10.1.1.297.8498,
doi:
10.2307/1909201,
JSTOR1909201
Starr, Ross M., ed. (1989). General equilibrium models of monetary economies: Studies in the static foundations of monetary theory. Economic theory, econometrics, and mathematical economics. Academic Press. p. 351.
ISBN978-0-12-663970-4.