Dear RSF:
Please join us next Wednesday, October 28 at 11 in the library and on Zoom, for a presentation by Visiting Scholar Bo Cowgill, “Clause and Effect: Theory and Field Experimental Evidence on Noncompete Clauses.”
Cowgill is Assistant Professor of Strategy at the University of Toronto. He holds a PhD in Business and Public Policy from the University of California, Berkeley and a BA in Public Policy from Stanford.
Prior to his appointment at the University of Toronto, Cowgill was at Columbia School of Business as Assistant Professor (2016-2026). His research uses field experiments, economic theory, and large-scale administrative data to study organizational economics, political economy, and innovation. He is particularly interested in how firms design labor markets, platforms, and information systems, with recent work on hiring, technological change, AI-mediated communication, and the political economy of firms and markets.
At RSF Cowgill is working on a project to advance the research agenda on noncompete agreements—clauses that limit workers’ post-employment mobility. Building on a large-scale randomized field experiment conducted with two major employers, he finds that non-competes reduce mobility and earnings even when unenforceable and are often signed without being noticed—highlighting gaps between legal form and behavioral reality.