Event

Category: Event

Economics Senior Experience Series Talk, Tuesday, March 10th at 4:30pm

Event: Economics Senior Experience Series Talk

Date: Tuesday, March 10th, at 4:30pm

Location: Wriston Auditorium

Speaker: Dean Yang. Professor of Economics & Public Policy at the University of Michigan.

Title: Abundance from Abroad: International Migration and the Developing World.

Description: What impact does international migration have on development of migrants’ home areas? Does migration promote economic growth at home? Or does it instead suppress growth and entrepreneurship in origin areas by increasing reliance on migrant remittances? We will explore what the latest research says about how international migration affects development in the world’s poor countries, and discuss some surprising new findings about new development paths that are opened up by international migration.

Economics Colloquia, Winter 2017: Mark Your Calendars

We have a number of excellent talks scheduled for this term that should be of interest to our majors.   Indiana University appears to be well represented.   Each of these talks is at 4:30 in Wriston Auditorium.

Thursday, February 16, 4:30 p.m., Wriston Auditorium

Deal (with) the Burn:  The Political Economy of U.S. Wildfire Management.
Dean Lueck
Ostrom Workshop and Department of Economics
Indiana University

Friday, February 17, 4:30 p.m.    Wriston Auditorium  (Senior Experience speaker)

Seven Secrets of Germany: Economic Resilience in an Era of Global Turbulence
David Audretsch
School of Public and Environmental Affairs
Indiana University

Thursday, March 2, 4:30 p.m.    Wriston Auditorium (Cancelled)

The Brazil Economy in Transition:  Beliefs, Leadership, and Institutional Change
Lee Alston
Ostrom Workshop and Department of Economics
Indiana University

Alston’s NBER paper is here, accessible on LU campus.

Alumni College Talk

Speaking of Professor Finkler, on Friday he will be giving a talk for the Alumni College.   Here are the particulars:

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Care (aka Obamacare):
An Efficient and Equitable Path to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Health?

Professor Marty Finkler

Warch Campus Center Cinema
2:10-3:00 p.m.
Friday, June 17

Economics / Science Hall Colloquium, Monday at 4:30, Wriston Auditorium

Professor Elizabeth J. Wilson from the Humphrey School of Public Policy at the University of Minnesota will be here Monday to talk about the (potential) future of electricity systems.

Professor Wilson is a rather extraordinary interdisciplinary scholar, with a background in environmental science and a Ph.D. in Engineering & Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University.  She is the recipient of one of the inaugural (2016) Andrew Carnegie Fellowships for her project “Nuclear Futures in a Windy World: A Comparative Analysis Balancing Energy Security, Climate Change, and Economic Development.”  She will spend the 2016-17 academic year in Denmark working on that.

Here is a blurb of her talking about sustainability and interdisciplinary research.

We will see you there.

wilson

 

 

Ta-Nehisi Coates Convocation Thursday

We are fortunate to have on campus one of America’s rising public intellectuals, Ta-Nehisi Coates, to deliver the Convocation on Thursday.  His talk is “Race in America: A Deeper Black,” starts at 11:10 in the Lawrence Memorial Chapel.

Mr. Coates is a recipient of one of this year’s Macarthur “Genius” Awards,  and his recent book, Between the World and Me, is a finalist for the National Book Award in non-fiction.

I became familiar with Coates from his writing in The Atlantic, where last year he wrote “The Case for Reparations,” where he argues that African Americans should be compensated for the past abuses of slavery, Jim Crow, “separate-but-equal,” and continuing racist housing policies.    A more recent piece, “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration” explores the devastation that a confluence of racist housing policies, drug laws, and differential policing has had on black families and communities.   The tragic thesis that Coates forwards is that the mass incarceration of African-American men is mostly by design, and not some unintended consequence of ill-conceived public policies.

The Convo is at 11:10.   I suggest you get there early if you want a seat.

Econ Colloquium — Big Data Monday at 4:30

UPDATE:  Schafer tapped to lead Large Synoptic Survey Telescope(LSST) Informatics and Statistics Science Collaboration.

 

Big Science + Big Data = Big Opportunities: An Overview of Statistics in Astronomy

Chad Schafer

Department of Statistics

Carnegie Mellon University

Progress in disciplines such as astronomy is increasingly being made through large-scale, multi-institution projects, often referred to as “Big Science.” It is only through careful statistical analysis that the massive amount of information (the “Big Data”) produced by these endeavors will be translated into answers to the questions of interest. This talk will make a connection between fundamental statistical concepts and the challenges facing astronomers and cosmologists as they seek to make use of the flood of data that result from modern experiments.

Monday, May 18, 4:30 p.m.

Steitz Hall 102

Ice Cream Social, Friday at 4:30 p.m.

Economics majors are welcome to an Ice Cream Social Friday at 4:30 in Briggs 217 (and probably the surrounding area).  Typically, the faculty member chosen for the Convocation Award has lunch with a few students after the Convo, but I actually have class in this slot and I decided that I wanted to include more than a handful of students.

I expect several of my colleagues on the faculty will be in attendance as well.

We have budgeted for 50 students, so ice cream priority will be given to those with either a Convo program or a ‘selfie’ taken at the Convo.   A selfie with an Econ prof will give you preferential  access to the toppings.   You can forward the selfies to me some time prior to Friday.  Please exercise discretion when taking the selfies (i.e., *not* during the performances or during Professor Niblock’s invocation).

If you could send an RSVP to Linda Peeters linda.o.peeters@lawrence.edu by Friday at noon, that would be super.

GMOs, Blood, Sperm, Human Milk…. not necessarily in that order

Here are two upcoming talks that are certainly of interest:

What you need to know about GMOs

Tuesday, April 7 in Warch Campus Cinema.  7 p.m.

Explore the benefits and drawbacks of GMOs in a panel discussion led by Professors Beth De Stasio and Dave Hall. They will cover the facts and myths of GMOs and how they affect human health and the environment.

For a recent economics survey article on GMOs, see Geoffrey Barrows, Steven Sexton, and David Zilberman. 2014. “Agricultural Biotechnology: The Promise and Prospects of Genetically Modified Crops.” Journal of Economic Perspectives, 28(1): 99-120.

 

For Sale: Markets in Eggs, Sperm and Human Milk in Modern America  

Kara Swanson, Associate Professor, Northeastern University School of Law.Thomas Steitz Hall of Science 102 – Lecture Hall.  4:30 p.m.

Here is a recent interview with Professor Swanson in The Atlantic Monthly.  For a recent economics survey article on blood, see Robert Slonim, Carmen Wang, and Ellen Garbarino. 2014. “The Market for Blood.” Journal of Economic Perspectives, 28(2): 177-96.

Playing the Market

For those of you interested in financial markets, we have an upcoming talk and a fall seminar that may be of interest.   First up, this Monday, Grinnell College professor, Mark Montgomery, will give a lecture about the ins and outs of “The Notorious Efficient Market Hypothesis,” as he calls it.

The efficient market hypothesis is essentially in two parts:  First, that all publicly available information is immediately internalized into the extant stock price.  Immediately is pretty fast, so it’s tough to beat the market.  So, secondly, it is not possible to earn above average returns without taking above average risks — a disheartening message for any would-be financiers.   I’m certain that Professor Montgomery will give us a lively talk.

The talk is Monday at 4:30 p.m. in Seitz 102.

For those of you interested in learning about how economists think about investments should consider the Investments directed study that we will offer in the fall of 2015.  In the next few weeks we will roll out our 2015-16 schedule, so watch this space for details.

Upcoming Talks (Two from Professor Finkler!)

Monday, February 16, 4:30 p.m., Steitz 102

Mark Montgomery, Grinnell College, “The Notorious Efficient Market Hypothesis,” Economics Colloquium

 

Wednesday February 18, 4:30 p.m.,  Steitz 102 

Merton Finkler, Lawrence University, “Health Policy – A Comparison of UK and US Approaches,”  London Week Special

 

Thursday, February 19, 7:30 p.m., Wriston Auditorium

Merton Finkler, Lawrence University, “China Ranks #1 or Does It? Should We Care?” Povolny Lecture, Wriston Auditorium

 

Tuesday, March 3, 4:30 p.m.,  Wriston Auditorium

Werner Troesken, University of Pittsburgh, “The Pox of Liberty: How the Constitution Left Americans Rich, Free, and Prone to Infection,”  Economics Colloquium sponsored by the Mellon Senior Experience Grant

 

 

 

Econ Colloquium, Wednesday at 4:30

Have you ever wondered if school boards matter?  What the trade-off is between administrative expertise and the public will?   If so, it’s your lucky day…

Knowledge, Vision, and Academic Return on Investment:
Do School Boards Matter?
 
Arnold Shober, Lawrence University
Michael Hartney, Lake Forest College
 

What is the trade-off between representation and expertise?  The American school board is an iconic institution of representative, local government, but one that attracts very little attention.  Fewer than 10 percent of voters bother to meander to the polls for school board elections.  Yet school boards are in the center of high-stakes debates about the Common Core, academic achievement, property taxes, school finance, and teacher assessment.  Using a national survey of school board members and our own calculation of district-level student achievement, we describe whether school board members appear to have the capacity to govern — and how that capacity relates to a key policy output, students’ academic performance.

Wednesday, October 1, 4:30 p.m.

Steitz Hall 102