UMass Amherst Senior Lecturer and marathon runner John Stifler talks to New England Public Radio’s Henry Epp about what it is like to run the Boston Marathon and gives a runner’s perspective on yesterday’s tragedy.
Monday’s Boston Marathon explosions have devastated the city and its residents. Lost in the tragedy’s aftermath was the typically joyful post-marathon celebration – a payoff for the participants’ months of training. UMass Amherst economics lecturer John Stifler was at the race. He also writes about running for New England Runner Magazine and the Daily Hampshire Gazette. Stifler spoke to New England Public Radio’s Henry Epp about the future of the race’s security and what it was like for runners who were stopped short of the finish line.
The UMass Amherst Department of Economics is proud to offer an undergraduate certificate in Applied Economic Research on Co-operative Enterprises. This credit-based certificate program involves 15 credits of coursework and an approved six credit field-based research internship with, or related to, a co-operative enterprise. Students gain experience in doing applied economic research in the context of collaboration with faculty, other students, and owner/managers of cooperative firms.
Each year the department, college, and university award scholarships to deserving students. Scholarship funding comes almost entirely from the generous gifts of our alumni and friends and are intended to recognize the hard work and academic success of our students, as a well as assist them with the expense of their education. This year 21 economics undergraduates were recognized with 26 departmental awards. We congratulate our students on their achievements and thank our alumni and friends for their support.
Timur Abduljalil ’14– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Jonathan Berke ’14– Economics Writing Award
Elysia Eastty ’15– E.W. Eldridge Jr. Memorial Scholarship
Cameron Kackley ’14– Highest Academic Achievement Award
Ryan King ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Keith Kittelson ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Alexander Kniazev ’14– E.W. Eldridge Jr. Memorial Scholarship
Shawn LeLievre ’14– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Alexander Major ’14– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship, Economics Alumni Award for Distinguished Service, & Ward McCarthy Scholarship for Interns
Katelynn Mann ’15– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Timothy Martin ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Vickash Mohanka ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Ken Naeh ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship & Highest Academic Achievement Award
Victoria Pfenninger ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Eric Popp ’15– Ward McCarthy Scholarship for Interns
Ariel Richman ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
James Santucci ’13– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
Luke Seaberg ’14– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship & Economics Alumni Award for Outstanding Achievement
Sanjay Singh ’13– Economics Alumni Award for Distinguished Service & James Kindahl Award
Collin Whittier ’15– Sherry Barber Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship
M.V. Lee Badgett, professor of economics, director of the Center for Public Policy and Administration, and an international expert on the economics of same-sex marriage, has appeared in several media outlets this week, as the U.S. Supreme Court heard two gay marriage cases.
On Bloomberg Television’s program “Bottom Line,” Badgett spoke about the economics of denying same-sex couples the right to marry. She was also quoted in this Politico article about how marriage laws have a significant impact on health insurance coverage. In addition, this Washington Post piece about taxes and government spending quotes Badgett and refers to a 2009 Williams Institute study that she co-authored.
On March 14, 2013 Professor Arindrajit Dube testified at the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Hearing, “Keeping up with a Changing Economy: Indexing the Minimum Wage.” One of six witnesses, Dube testified that increasing and indexing minimum wage would reduce employee turnover and poverty. Watch the full hearing.
James Boyce, UMass Amherst economics professor and director of the Program on Development, Peacebuilding, and the Environment at the Political Economy Research Institute, is interviewed about the relationship between economic inequality and environmental pollution.
In this new collection of essays, James K. Boyce explores the idea that the environment belongs in equal measure to us all; a clean and safe environment is not a commodity to be allocated on the basis of wealth, nor a privilege to be allocated through political power, but rather a basic human right. Building upon this premise, Boyce explores the many ways in which economics can be refashioned into an instrument for advancing human well-being and environmental health. Topics covered include environmental justice, disaster response, globalization and the environment, industrial toxins and other pollutants, cap-and-dividend climate policies, and agricultural biodiversity.
George I. Treyz, 76, died at his home in Amherst, Massachusetts on February 14th, 2013. He is survived by his wife of 54 years, Sidney, sons Victor and Frederick, brother Russell and six grandchildren.
For more than three decades, George Treyz was a pillar of the Economics Department at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. After receiving degrees from Princeton (BA) and Cornell (PhD), he taught at Haverford College and came to UMass in 1968. He remained a pillar of the Economics program in Amherst until his retirement in 1997, and even beyond because he continued to teach from his position at Regional Economic Modeling, the Amherst-based company he founded in 1980.
A well-respected and valued teacher, Treyz is best known as a pioneer of computer-based regional economic models, the types of models now widely used by regional and national governments in assessing alternative economic policies. In the 1970’s, he worked with the Nobel Prize-winner Laurence Klein, along with Ann Friedlander and Benjamin Stevens, to develop the Massachusetts Economic Policy Analysis (MEPA) model. Later, he expanded and generalized the techniques developed for MEPA to develop the models used by REMI and by regional models used throughout the world. In 1994, Treyz and his colleagues developed the first multi-regional United States model consisting of the fifty states and District of Columbia.
Treyz and his colleagues published widely, disseminating their work so that it could be used by others. In 1993 he wrote Regional Economic Modeling: A Systemic Approach to Forecasting and Policy Analysis. Whether in Amherst, in his work to improve economic policy in Massachusetts or throughout the United States, or in the Economics Department, George Treyz was a conscientious and devoted citizen, always available to colleagues, students, or others who needed help. We were proud to have him as a colleague, and we will miss him.
Professor Arindrajit Dube’s research on minimum wage has been widely cited in the media. In the paper Minimum Wage Effects Across State Borders: Estimates Using Contiguous Counties, Dube and co-authors, T. William Lester and Michael Reich, examined minimum wage policies between 1990 and 2006, comparing all contiguous county-pairs in the United States that straddle a state border, and found that an increased minimum wage does not have adverse employment effects. Dube told the Wall Street Journal that there is no “evidence of any loss of employment or hours for the type of minimum-wage changes we have seen in the U.S. in the last 20 years.”
President Barack Obama cited this study during the 2013 State of the Union address in support of raising the federal minimum wage to $9.00 per hour.
The Department of Economics announces the passing of Stephen Resnick, one of our greatest scholars and a founder of the modern department. Steve was one of the leading Marxist economists and Marxian theorists of his generation. A winner of the University of Massachusetts Distinguished Teaching Award, Steve’s classes inspired many scores of graduate students and thousands of undergraduates.
Steve earned his PhD at MIT in 1964 and came to UMass Amherst in 1973 after teaching at Yale and City College of New York. With longtime collaborator UMass Amherst Economics Professor Emeritus Richard Wolff, Steve was a founder and leader of the Association of Economic and Social Analysis and the Rethinking Marxism journal, conference, and movement. Steve was Professor Emeritus and Helen Sheridan Memorial Scholar. At the time of his death, he was working on a multitude of projects including entitlements and benefits in a capitalist economy.
