News

Professor Emerita Carol Heim wins the Jonathan Hughes Prize for Excellence in Teaching Economic History

Professor Emerita Carol Heim has received the Jonathan Hughes Prize for Excellence in Teaching Economic History at this year's Economic History Association meeting in Pittsburgh.  The annual Jonathan Hughes Prize is awarded to recognize excellence in teaching economic history. Jonathan Hughes was an outstanding scholar and a committed and influential teacher of economic history. The prize includes a $1,200 cash award. The winner is selected by the EHA Committee on Education and Teaching. The EHA recognizes excellence in research, publication, and teaching of economic history by awarding several annual and biennial prizes at the President’s Awards Banquet during the annual meetings.

New Department Chair, Patrick Mason

The Economics Department is thrilled to welcome the new Chair, Patrick Mason, Professor of Economics.  His primary areas of interest include labor, political economy, development, education, social identity, and crime. He is particularly interested in racial inequality, educational achievement, income distribution, unemployment, economics of identity (race and religion), family environment and socioeconomic wellbeing, and transitions in family structure and public policy, racial profiling, computerization and employment, and innovation and development in Caribbean economies. In addition to membership in the America Economic Association and the National Economic Association, Professor Mason is also the past Chairman of the Board of Directors, Partners for Dignity & Rights (formerly, the National Economic & Social Rights Initiative (NESRI); and, Member, Board of Directors, Fair Foods Standards Council (FFSC). Professor Mason is general editor of the International Encyclopedia of Race and Racism, 2nd Edition, Macmillan Reference USA (February 2013) and author of The economics of structural racism, Cambridge University Press (forthcoming). 

Latest Department News and Updates

 

Isabella Weber, Featured in New Yorker profile,   What if We’re Thinking About Inflation All Wrong?

Nancy Folbre, In Bloomberg, 
 The Breaking of the Caring Economy

 

The Philip Gamble Memorial Lecture, Took place on May 4th with Speaker: Dr. William (“Sandy”) Darity, Duke University. The topic: Does Everyone Lose from Racism? Insights from Stratification. Watch the recording

The 2023 Undergraduate Debate, Took place on May 11th, the topic "Will AI Benefit the Economy"  Watch the recording

M. V. Lee Badgett, In the Asia Times LGBTQ Economic Inclusion

Nancy Folbre, Appeared on the How to Save a Country Podcst

Isabella Weber, In The Times,  Lone voice on inflation grows louder

Richard Wolff, In AlertNet,   The debt ceiling debate is a massive deception against the public

Jayati Ghosh, In Project Syndicate, The High Cost of Carbon Pricing

Jayati Ghosh, Was a panelist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research

Sheila Gilroy, Wins 2023 SBS Outstanding Staff Award

Isabella Weber, On the NPR Planet Money program

Jayati Ghosh, in The Economist Finding the money to fix the world requires a rethink on tax

Lenore Palladino, Awarded Foundation HCM Grant, for research on corporate policies toward freedom of association.

Gerald Epstein, in TruthOut  Three Banks Have Now Collapsed. A Progressive Economist Explains Why.

Gregor Semieniuk,  Testified before the Senate Committee on the Budget concerning stranded fossil fuel assets

Robert Pollin, Interviewed by Naked Capitalism Fossil Fuel Industry Phase-Out: Three Critical Worker Guarantees for a Just Transition

Gerald Epstein, Writes column for Institute for New Economic Thinking Financial Crisis of 2023: Protecting Big Finance, Coming and Going

Robert Pollin, Interviewed for Truth Out by MIT's Noam Chomsky about how capitalism undergirds the climate crisis in light of the latest UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report.

Arin Dube, interviewed by NPR  These are the job sectors that are hiring and experiencing wage growth

Patrick Mason, published a new book "Economics of Structural Racism"

Gregor Semieniuk, Interviewed by Truth Out ,  What Would It Take to Defeat Big Oil? A Progressive Economist Weighs In.

Ina Ganguli, Elected as a Research Associate in the National Bureau of Economic Research’s program on Productivity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Gerald Friedman, in The Shoe String, shares his latest economic analysis of a single payer health care bill

Arindrajit Dube, Researched cited in Washington Post The powerful lesson from 18 million workers getting a pay raise over $15

Nancy Folbre, quoted in The Daily Star - The economic contribution of a stay-at-home mother

Lee Badgett, quoted in USA Today, Straight couples get married earlier than gay couples. Here's a look at why

Gerald Epstein, quoted in US News, Don’t Call it a Bailout

Isabella Weber, quoted in The Hill, Strong March Report

Isabella Weber, mentioned in NY Times story,  reflecting on the legacy of Arthur Burns, who led the Federal Reserve from 1970 to 1978

Gerald Epstein, quoted in The Hill,  A free market no more? Rules of the game have changed after banking crisis, some say

Nancy Folbre, quoted in ABC News, What GDP is and why it matters

Arindrajit Dube, quoted in NBC News article,  Covid transformed the U.S. labor market, and it isn’t done yet

Ina Ganguli Elected to be a Research Associate at the NBER

The NBER’s Board of Directors elected Ina Ganguli as a Research Associate in the NBER’s program on Productivity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship.  The NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers and business professionals. NBER-affiliated researchers study a wide range of topics and they employ many different methods in their work. The NBER research brings critical information to many important public policy debates. Affiliation with the NBER is a privilege that enables a researcher to participate in a vibrant scholarly community that is committed to active and open discussion of research. Research Associates are the backbone of the NBER. They are the long-term affiliates who largely determine the direction and tone of research within each program. They play a critical role in helping to identify promising research initiatives, in recruiting new Faculty Research Fellow – the junior members of each program – and in raising funds to support program activities. The NBER is organized around twenty research programs, each of which consists of scholars whose expertise relates to a common core topic.  Program members disseminate their research by presenting papers at program meetings and by submitting their work to the NBER Working Paper Series. The working papers are broadly distributed to universities, policy-makers, and members of the press, and they are also available on the NBER web site

2023 Philip Gamble Memorial Lecture featuring William “Sandy” Darity.“DOES EVERYONE LOSE FROM RACISM? INSIGHTS FROM STRATIFICATION ECONOMICS”.

The Philip Gamble Memorial Lecture took place on  May 4th - 5:30 pm inside the Bowker Auditorium on the campus of  UMass-Amherst. The lecture featured William “Sandy” Darity. The lecture was titled  “DOES EVERYONE LOSE FROM RACISM? INSIGHTS FROM STRATIFICATION ECONOMICS”.  The event was open to the public.  For more information about the Gamble Lecture visit this page
**Watch the recording of the lecture**

 

Jayati Ghosh Wins the 2023 Galbraith Award

Jayati Ghosh has received the 2023 Galbraith Award from the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association (AAEA). Following in the spirit of John Kenneth Galbraith, the AAEA choses economists for this award according to these criteria: Galbraith’s capacity to integrate scholarship with statesmanship, and his unparalleled record of achievements in research, education and public service, embody the spirit and aspiration of agricultural economists. Galbraith’s outstanding achievements demonstrate that agricultural and applied economics are effective launching pads for research and for policy careers that address all ranges of social issues, and have impacts on societal thinking and global policy.  AAEAs aim with this award is to recognize scholars and leaders who, like J.K. Galbraith, possess a record of intellectual leadership with service to the nation and the world. Read more...
 

Gregor Semieniuk, Presents at TedXBoston

Interests behind fossil-fuel extraction for fossil fuel phaseout. Fossil fuel interests are often identified with a few powerful companies and oil-rich countries; therefore, policies aimed at reducing fossil fuels on the supply side tend to be focused on this small group of actors with vested interests. However, most companies are owned by shareholders (often via funds), to earn profits. As a result a much larger group of person have vested financial interests in the continuation of fossil fuel extraction.  Watch the Ted Talk.

Deepankar Basu's Research on Hate Crimes in India in the Washington Post

Since Prime Minister Narendra Modi took control in 2014, hate crimes against minorities in India have skyrocketed by 300 percent, according to a 2019 study by Deepankar Basu, an economics professor who studies South Asian politics at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst.
Since then, Modi’s party has only become stronger in India’s parliament, but updated hate crime statistics are hard to find, multiple experts said. After 2017, India’s crime bureau stopped collecting data on hate crimes, news reports show. Read more...

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