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Department of Economics Newsletter

Department of Economics Newsletter

DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS NEWSLETTER

Department of Economics Newsletter

June 2014

GENERAL DEPARTMENT NEWS

The Economics Department at Johns semester, to new Chair . Jon will Our annual Richard T. Ely lecture this year Hopkins has had another busy year with return full-time in September. Greg Duffee, was given by Charles Manski (below) from multiple events and many developments the Professor of Economics, , who gave three among the faculty and graduate students. returned from a one-year leave at the Office stimulating lectures on “Public Policy in an This Newsletter will cover many of them but of Financial Research, where he served as Uncertain World.” Professor Manski’s week feel free to keep track of all developments as Executive Fellow. Going in the other with us was filled with discussions of they happen on the department website, direction, Chris Carroll began a leave in economics and , meetings with http://www.econ.jhu.edu/. January to be the Assistant Director and faculty and students, and several lunches and Chief Economist of the Office of Research of dinners. We welcomed in January, 2014, two new the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Assistant Professors. Anton Korinek arrived from with a specialization in The Department was well represented at the International Monetary Economics. He AEA Meetings in January, 2014 in taught a graduate course in macro theory Philadelphia. Among the faculty, Jorge and an undergraduate course in Evolution Balat, Larry Ball, Chris Carroll, Greg and Economics in Spring, 2014. Yuya Duffee, Jon Faust, Olivier Jeanne, Anton Takahashi came from the University of Korinek, Robert Moffitt, Yuya Sasaki, and Mannheim with specializations in Industrial Jonathan Wright were on the program. The Organization and Econometrics. This Spring traditional cocktail party and reception also semester he taught a graduate course in drew a number of current and former numerical methods and an undergraduate graduate students and faculty. We will be course in Labor Economics. Anton and Yuya having another in January, 2015 in Boston. will greatly strengthen our already-strong Mark it on your calendars. faculty concentrations in macro and in applied micro (especially Industrial We had several distinguished visitors to the Organization), respectively. And we are Department this year. Our graduate looking forward to Ying Chen joining us in alumnus Takeshi Amemiya, Emeritus Poster for the Richard Ely Distinguished September. Ying is currently at Professor of Economics and Classics at Lecture Series 2013-2014: Southampton and specializes in Economic Stanford (below), visited us in October and Theory. gave a lecture entitled “Econometric Reflections Plus My Recent Interest in We are also happy to report that Dr. Robert Ancient Greece and Chinese History.” Barbera, a graduate alumnus from our Department, has assumed a greater role in the Department this year, teaching introductory Macroeconomics as well as Economic Forecasting and serving as a Fellow of our Center for .

Sadly, we are losing Hulya Eraslan to Rice University. We wish Hulya and her family We look forward to the Spring 2015 Ely well in her new location. Lectures as well, which will be given by Professor John Geanakoplos from Yale. Our faculty continue to perform important government service. Jon Faust, our Louis J. We had several visitors this academic year Maccini Professor of Economics, is who enlivened the Department. Professor concluding his two-year leave to the Federal Anna Scherbina from the University of Reserve Board, having served as a Special California Davis visited in the Fall, teaching Advisor to and, this last DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS NEWSLETTER 2

Corporate Finance and Behavioral Finance. FACULTY NEWS Evans and Hopkins graduate alumnus Zhong Professor Scherbina gave an interesting Zhao on “The Fertility Effect of Catastrophe: seminar on behavioral finance, bubbles, and U.S. Hurricane Births.” related phenomena. Dr. Egon Zakrejsek Jorge Balat continues his work on auction spent the Fall with us on leave from the models and production functions and Olivier Jeanne’s work in international macro Federal Reserve Board. He is an expert on presented his work at several universities and has continued to lead to numerous invited credit markets, banking, and monetary conferences this year, both in the U.S. and speaking engagements at INET, the San policy. Professor Nobosumi Sagara from abroad. Francisco Fed, the Bank of Japan, and the Hosei University, an expert economic Bank of Korea. theorist, visited us last year and again this Larry Ball continues to serve as a Visiting this Fall. Dr. Berna Demiralp, our graduate Scholar in the IMF Research Department as Edi Karni, the Scott and Barbara Black alumnus, visited us in the Fall and taught well as serving on the Advisory Board of Professor of Economics, was the Hallsworth- undergraduate econometrics. Dr. Priyanka Economic Research Forum in Turkey. He Simon Visiting Professor at the Department Anand from Mathematica Policy Research also continues to make presentations around of Economics at the University of also visited us and taught undergraduate the world including the West Indies, Brazil, Manchester. He was also the keynote labor economics. Professor Che-Lin Su from Morocco, Turkey, Germany, Scotland, and speaker at a conference at Manchester and the Booth Business School at visited Sweden. He has also written about the need also presented at the Manchester Economic us this Spring for a few days and gave for more expansionary fiscal policy with Larry Theory workshop. His joint work with lectures to our graduate students as well as a Summers and Brad DeLong. graduate alumnus Nan Zhou was presented talk in our research workshop. We were and others have endorsed his proposal for a at Warwick in May. happy to have Dr. John Driscoll from the 4% inflation target. Professor Ball has also Ali Khan, the Abram Hutzler Professor of Federal Reserve Board visit us this Spring, filed a lawsuit in federal court against the Political Economy, gave a keynote speech at teaching our undergraduate Intermediate Federal Reserve Board under the Freedom of the UECE Lisbon Conference on Game Macroeconomics class as well as attending Information Act to obtain legal memoranda Theory and Application entitled “Subjective the macro seminar and discussing research setting forth the justification for extending Randomized Strategies in Games with with our faculty. Professor Robert Miller emergency loans to Bear Sterns and AIG in Correlated Information.” He also gave the from Carnegie Mellon is visiting us this 2008. We are hoping he does not sue the plenary address at XXII European Workshop Summer and working on research projects Chair of the Johns Hopkins Economics on General Equilibrium Theory entitled with our faculty. Department to obtain justification for setting faculty salaries. “Finite-Player Games with Private The Center for Financial Economics (CFE) Information.” continues to support teaching and research Chris Carroll gave two keynotes speeches Anton Korinek was selected as one of four at the intersection of macroeconomics and this year, one at the European Central Bank 2013 IMF Research Fellows and spent the Fall finance. The director, Jon Faust, will return Conference on Household Finance and semester at the International Monetary Fund from public service leave as special adviser to Consumption and one at the St. Louis doing research on capital controls and the Federal Reserve Chairmen Ben Bernanke Federal Reserve Bank Research Symposium international monetary system. In Spring and Janet Yellen. Jonathan Wright stood in on Restoring Household Financial Stability 2014, he took over the Graduate as Acting Director last Fall and Bob Barbera After the Great Recession. Macroeconomics course that Lou Maccini stood in this Spring, with Olivier Jeanne Greg Duffee, the Carl Christ Professor of had been teaching for over 30 years. He also helping out in student advising. Jon Faust Economics, spent 2013 at the Department of developed a new junior/senior level course on has been at the center of the policy process the Treasury. He also gave a talk in "Evolution and Economics" that analyzed for the last two and a half years, and will November 2013 at the Shanghai Advanced how evolutionary dynamics shape our bring his unique insights to teaching and Institute of Finance and led discussions at the economic system, from individual behavior research upon his return. The Minor in Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco Zero to such complex topics as risk-taking in the Financial Economics continues to expand and Lower Bound Conference in October and at financial system. the job placement record of graduates in this Tel Aviv University in December. Minor has been outstanding. Elena Krasnokutskaya gave a talk at Bruce Hamilton, Professor Emeritus in the Georgetown University in November 2013 The CFE has been regularly quoted in the Department, continues to teach his popular on “Multi-Attribute Auction Model with press. Bob Barbera has appeared on undergraduate course in Antitrust as well as Unobserved Bidder Attributes.” She has also television, written an op-ed in the Financial the major Principles of started a new project with her colleagues Times, and contributes to the Survey of course. He also serves as the Director of Jorge Balat and Nick Papageorge. Professional Forecasters. Commentaries Undergraduate Studies. This Spring, he put about some recent economic developments together a new course for undergraduates Robert Moffitt, the Krieger-Eisenhower are available on the CFE website: called Faculty Research in Economics which Professor of Economics, began a term as http://cfe.econ.jhu.edu/. The CFE is actively brought our faculty to a group of students to Chair of the American Economic Association fundraising with the aim of recruiting new tell them about his or her research. Committee on Economic Statistics. He also faculty and offering a major in financial is serving as President of the Population economics. Yingyao Hu has been named an Associate Association of America and gave his

Editor of Econometric Reviews. He also has Presidential Address to the Association in been named a Fellow of the Journal of May, with the title “The Deserving Poor, the Econometrics and he won the Kuznets Prize Family, and the U.S. Welfare System.” from the Journal of Population Economics for his 2013 paper jointly authored with Richard DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS NEWSLETTER 3

Nick Papageorge gave presentations this Graduate student activity this year continues year at Duke, UNC, Cal Tech, NYU, and Penn. to be extensive. Informal reading groups He continues his work on medical innovation, consisting primarily of advanced graduate personality and entrepreneurship, and students plus faculty members met behavioral models of schooling. periodically to read and discuss papers in labor economics, industrial organization, Yuya Sasaki gave talks at George theory, and macro and finance. These Washington University and the University of groups are popular because they allow Tokyo. He continues his work on panel data, graduate students to continue to meet and measurement error, and dynamic discrete discuss papers in their area even after choice models. coursework has been completed.

Yuya Takahashi joined us in January. In the As noted in previous newsletters, the Hearty congratulations to all these graduate 2013-2014 academic year, he made Department has several funded awards to students, who exemplify the best of the presentations at the Stockholm School of honor some of our most accomplished Johns Hopkins graduate program. Economics, IEIF Rome, the Paris School of graduate students. The Eugenio and Patricia Economics, Kyoto University, and Castillo Award is given to the student who Ten students successfully defended their Pennsylvania State University. He also made displayed the best performance in their first dissertations in oral examinations since our a conference presentation at Berlin IO Day at two years in the graduate program. The last Newsletter. They are Indra Astrayuda, DIW Berlin. 2013-2014 recipient was Chang Ma. Colleen Carey, Matthew Raskin, Prathibashi Seneviratne, Matthew White, Jonathan Wright served as Acting Director The Bruce Hamilton Research Seminar Ruli Xiao, Xiaochen Xu, Wei Zhao, Yizhen of the Center for Financial Economics in the Award is given to the advanced graduate Zhao, and Nan Zhou. A few pictures of the department in the Fall. He has been named student who has demonstrated the best students and their examining committees Coeditor of the Journal of Applied performance in one of the department’s are shown below. Econometrics and co-organizer of the NBER research workshops. Again funded by Workshop on Forecasting and Empirical Eugenio and Patricia Castillo, it is named in Methods in Macro and Finance. He also honor of Professor Emeritus Bruce Hamilton presented a paper on seasonal adjustment at who was well-known for his insightful and the Brookings Papers on Economic Activity clever comments at seminars. This Spring’s which generated considerable discussion. award went jointly to Ryan Bush and Gizem Kosar for their remarks, comments, and And we have welcomed two new babies to questions at our workshops. the Department this year, the proud parents being Professor Jonathan Wright, and Professor Elena Krasnokutskaya.

GRADUATE STUDENT NEWS

The Department welcomed 11 incoming first- year students in October with a party which faculty and other graduate students attended. A photo gallery from the party is available at: http://econ.jhu.edu/2013/11/21/department- of-economics-welcomed-new-doctoral- students/

The Professor Joel Dean Undergraduate Teaching Award was established in 2009 to

recognize graduate students who exhibited extraordinary performance in teaching Hopkins undergraduates. This award was creatively conceived by Professor Dean’s son Joel and his wife Monia. Professor Dean received his Ph.D. in Economics from the

University of Chicago in 1936 and was a We will welcome 10 new students next Fall as pioneer in applying economics to business well. A new and revised Math Camp for decision-making. The 2013-2014 recipients them will be taught this August by graduate were Alanna Bjorklund-Young, Ryan Bush, student Metin Uyanik. Liuchun Deng, Christopher Martin, and Terrance Oey. DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS NEWSLETTER 4

Also, Gizem Kosar attended the Search and Michael Fratantoni (Ph.D., 1995) was Matching Workshop at the Federal Reserve recently promoted to Chief Economist at the Bank of Philadelphia. Metin Uyanik visited Mortgage Bankers Association. the University of Queensland and presented a paper on the "Non-Emptiness of the Core Daniel Gubits (Ph.D., 2008) and his wife with Discontinuous Preferences” and he Sarah had a baby daughter Natalie Ruth last attended a conference on the History of July. Economic Thought at the University of Richmond. Boqun Wang has a paper entitled Frank Gunter (Ph.D., 1986) is still at Lehigh. "Volatility and Economic Regimes: Evidence His book "The Political Economy of Iraq: from a Large Transitional Economy" Restoring Balance in a Post-Conflict Society" coauthored with Professor Dennis Tao Yang (Edward Elgar, 2013) was published last year, presented at the 2014 AEA Meetings and he based on his two years in Iraq as an economic coauthored with Davide Furceri and Andrea advisor. Pescatori a small article called the "box" in John Hartwick (Ph.D., 1969) is in the midst the chapter 3 of the World Economic of doing an undergraduate textbook in urban Outlook. He also visited the World Economic economics for ME Sharpe, which brings back Outlook group of the Research Department memories of his time at Hopkins when urban at the IMF in Jan 2014. economist Ed Mills was in residence and who later collaborated with Bruce Hamilton on a Jiaxiong Yao presented a paper entitled “Progressive Taxation and Precautionary textbook. John’s thesis was on regional There is life after the dissertation. Saving Over the Life Cycle” at the 28th input-output tables. Annual Congress of the European Economic Guofang Huang (Ph.D., 2011) started at the The Department had a record crop of Association/67th European Meeting of the Carnegie-Mellon Tepper School of Business students on the job market this year, . as an Assistant Professor of Marketing last including Natsuki Arai, Weining Bao, Blair year. Chapman, Yoichi Goto, Leyla Karakas, Several students attended the January 2015 meetings of the AEA in Philadelphia and Christopher Martin, Collin Rabe, Lucia Susanne James-Burdumy (Ph.D., 1999) has came to the Departmental Reception. Tiererova, Ruli Xiao, Hou Wang, Xi Yang, been promoted to Senior Fellow at Jiae Yoo, and Nan Zhou. They have Mathematica Policy Research and continued ALUMNI NEWS accepted positions throughout the country to direct two evaluations, one focused on and around the world - National Chung evaluating the US Department of Education's Cheng University, Xi'an Jiao Tong University, Yonghong An (Ph.D., 2011) is moving to the Race to the Top and School Improvement Montclair State University, Deloitte, Grant programs and the other focused on Syracuse University, the FDIC, the University Economics Department at Texas A&M in July. evaluating a program called Playworks, of Richmond, the Analysis Group, Indiana which is designed to provide opportunities University, the IMF, and the USC Lusk Center Daniel Barth (Ph.D., 2012) is finishing his for organized play and physical activity for Real Estate. We wish them the best in time at Hamilton College and is moving to during recess in low-income schools. their future careers. the Office of Financial Research at the Department of the Treasury. Francesco Mongelli (Ph.D., 1992) moved to Many of our other graduate students had the Research Department of the European notable activities this academic year. Geoffrey Gilbert (Ph.D., 1975) became Central Bank as Senior Adviser in February, Natsuki Arai presented a paper entitled Professor Emeritus of Economics in July, charged with the task of catalysing projects "Evaluating the Efficiency of FOMC's New retiring after 40 years of teaching, 37 of them on Payment Systems (stability, efficiency, Economic Projections" at several at Hobart and William Smith Colleges innovation and growth enhancing effects), conferences last summer. Another of his (Geneva, NY). His teaching and writing over Euro area convergence, and governance. He papers, "Using Forecast Evaluation to the years have focused on poverty and also continues to teach at the Goethe Improve the Accuracy of the Greenbook population, with Malthus a particular University. Forecast" has been accepted to interest. He and his wife Mundy celebrated the International Journal of Forecasting. their 40th wedding anniversary and their (Ph.D., 1956) was honored for Yajing Jiang presented a joint paper with younger daughter gave them their first his major lifelong contributions to economics Professor Yingyao Hu and fellow student grandchild about a year and a half ago. at a conference in Washington in May with Ryan Bush, "On Misclassification Errors in presentations by Jinyong Hahn, James Self-reported Drug Use," at the 2013 Paul de Grauwe (Ph.D., 1974) recently Heckman, Ariel Pakes, John Rust, Thomas Asian Meeting of the Econometric Society. moved from the University of Leuven to the Sargent and James Stock. Johns Hopkins Burcin Kisacikoglu has a joint paper with London School of Economics. faculty in attendance included Carl Christ, Refet Gurkaynak and Barbara Rossi Jorge Balat, Yingyao Hu, Robert Moffitt, forthcoming as a chapter in Advances in Mark Dynarski (Ph.D., 1981) is now a senior Nick Papageorge, and Yuya Sasaki. Fellow Econometrics: VAR Models in fellow (nonresident) at the Brookings JHU Ph.D Takeshi Amemiya was in Macroeconomics, Financial Economics and Institution and has his own research firm, attendance. Forecasting- New Developments and Pemberton Research. Applications.

DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS NEWSLETTER 5

Richard Willke (Ph.D., 1982) has now spent A NOTE OF APPRECIATION 23 years with Pfizer and its legacy companies, following time in the Ohio State Economics Department and the American Finally, I would like to thank those graduate Medical Association Center for Health Policy alumni of the Department who have Research. At Pfizer he is a vice president for generously made gifts in the last year. They Outcomes & Evidence, leading a group that include Julie Hudson and Steve Holden, does outcomes research, i.e., cost- Wilhelmina Leigh, Dan Stone, Takeshi effectiveness and other health economic Senda, and Jiri Slacalek. These donations studies, comparative effectiveness research go directly to graduate student support, for (CER), and quality of life research, used to Research Assistant supplements, lunches for support Pfizer products for registration and the graduate student reading groups, and related activities. At the conference dinner, Carl Christ read reimbursement. Within the outcomes another of his famous limericks: research community, he has served terms on various boards, task forces, and study I would also like to make special note of two exceptional gifts. Reid Nagle (Ph.D., 1979) His earliest work is replete sections, and had recent publications on made a generous gift last year to the With supplies of corn cotton and wheat smoking cessation modeling, heterogeneity Departments of Economics and History, On cross section data, than Nerlove, of treatment effect methods and remembering Carl Christ and Lou Galambos. No one has lavished greater love perspectives, and policy aspects of CER. He His gift will go directly to supporting In this field he cannot be beat has thoroughly enjoyed being associated graduate student research. We have with the development of new medicines; established the Reid Nagle Fund to support Jennifer Roff (Ph.D., 2003) was recently there's no shortage of interesting work to do that research and to receive additional awarded tenure at Queens College. She tells in this area. He and his wife Brenda live in contributions made for that purpose. And all graduate students who are passing Flemington New Jersey, having raised and Alain D’Hoore (Ph.D.,2002) made a through New York to get in touch. exported four more Buckeyes. His home email is [email protected]. generous gift, thanking his advisors Lou Katheryn Russ (Ph.D., 2004) was tenured Maccini and Ali Khan, to support graduate and promoted to Associate Professor in the Zhong Zhao (Ph.D., 2002) won the Kuznets student travel. We have established the Department of Economics at the University Prize from the Journal of Population Bretton Woods Travel Fund to support such of California at Davis and was appointed a Economics for his 2013 paper jointly travel and to receive additional Research Associate at the NBER. This year authored with Richard Evans and Hopkins contributions. she is serving as a Guest Editor for a special professor Yingyao Hu on “The Fertility Effect Please consider a gift, which you can make issue of the IMF Economic Review on Cross- of Catastrophe: U.S. Hurricane Births.” by going to JHU Giving Border Banking along with Galina Hale from (http://krieger.jhu.edu/giving) and the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. We are sad to note the passing of two of our graduate alumni. Robert Fogel (Ph.D., 1964) designating that your gift go to the Eva Sierminska (Ph.D., 2003) has been spent his career at the Department of Economics of the Krieger named a Research Fellow at IZA and last year and won the in 1993 for his School of Arts and Sciences. If you choose published two chapters on “The Distribution fundamental work in . to contribute online, please put “KSAS-Dept of Assets and Debt,” and “The Joint Lance Davis (Ph.D., 1952) was an eminent of Economics” in the “Other” field in the Distribution of Income and Wealth” with co- historian of financial markets who spent online form. authors in Income Inequality: Economic most of his career at Cal Tech. We will miss

Disparities and the Middle Class in Affluent them. Countries, edited by Janet C. Gornick and Robert Moffitt, Chair Markus Jäntti. She has also published a paper "Wealth distribution within couples and STAFF NEWS financial decision making," with Markus M. Grabka and Jan Marcus in the Review of

Economics of the Household. She still lives in Our superb office staff--Donna Althoff, Luxembourg. Maggie Potts, and IT Administrator Nina Julie Smith (Ph.D., 2002) received tenure Agopian--are serving the department well. and promotion to Associate Professor in the We have missed staffer Karen Allen during Department of Economics at Lafayette her medical leave. Donna, our long-standing College. departmental administrator, began her 30th year with the Department in January, still Craig Thornton (Ph.D., 1978) was re-elected putting up with the faculty. to the board of directors of AcademyHealth (the major professional organization for health services research) and will serve as the

organization's treasurer.

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