DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS NEWSLETTER Department of Economics Newsletter June 2014 GENERAL DEPARTMENT NEWS The Economics Department at Johns semester, to new Chair Janet Yellen. 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 Carl Christ Professor of Economics, Northwestern University, 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 econometrics, 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 Maryland 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 Financial Economics. 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 Ben Bernanke 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 Chicago 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. Paul Krugman 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 Microeconomics 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.