Preston McAfee peers into the future (and sees market design)

Microsoft offers predictions from some of its futurists (and apparently economics fits somewhere between AI and data science...:

From AI and data science to cryptography: Microsoft researchers offer 16 predictions for ’16> 

Preston McAfee

Chief Economist, Microsoft

What will be the key breakthrough or advance in economics in 2016?Economists are struggling to understand why the current recovery involves low-productivity increases, in comparison to past recoveries, and whether low productivity is a new normal. I expect this conundrum will be answered in 2016, and the answer could have important implications for government policies to boost growth. Of course, it may turn out that the problem is measurement error, and that we are growing normally.

Looking forward 10 years to 2026, what will be the major advance in economics?Over the next 10 years, the major breakthrough of economics will be in applications of market design, which improves the efficiency of markets using a combination of game theory, economics and algorithm design. We’ve already seen fruitful application in search auctions, spectrum auctions, kidney exchange and school assignment.

How would you complete this sentence: 2016 will be the year that…Silicon Valley recognizes that the value of Uber is its marketplace, not the data, but that is probably too optimistic. The big data bubble has longer to run.