The Department of Economics is thrilled to announce the hiring of two new faculty members. Since last fall, search committees have been reviewing candidates for one full-time, tenure-track position in Macroeconomics at the rank of Assistant Professor, for which we received more than 400 applications, and one Assistant Teaching Professor position, for which we received more than 200 applications. The two search committees interviewed the candidates at the AEA conference in January, and invited finalists to campus to give a talk and meet with faculty. We are pleased to announce that our two offers for these positions have been accepted.
Brian Greaney accepted our offer for the position of Assistant Professor. His primary interests are macroeconomics and international trade. The search committee was impressed with Brian’s Job Market Paper, “The Distributional Effects of Uneven Regional Growth” (Nov 2019). Greaney is expected to complete his PhD in Economics this spring, when he will graduate from Yale University. Greaney was initially concerned about the September start date of our job posting, as he and his wife are expecting their first child early this summer. Thanks to the generous financial support of our Visiting Committee, we were able to move up the appointment start date, and therefore provide health insurance for Greaney and his wife. We look forward to welcoming Greaney this summer.
We are also pleased to welcome Yael Jacobs this fall as an Assistant Teaching Professor. Jacobs’ research centers around applying microeconomic theory, particularly in the areas of labor economics, and industrial organization. Her job market paper, entitled, “Income-Share Agreements on the Job Market: Debt Versus Equity” (February 2020) (Please email jjacobs7@uw.edu for most recent version of paper) focuses on student’s use of a new financial tool called Income Share Agreements when securing financial aid for College. Jacobs is also working on a paper which will be published in the forthcoming American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, a high honor for any researcher. Jacobs wrote the paper, entitle, “Communities, Co-ops, and Clubs: Social Capital and Incentives in Large Collective Organizations,” with Aaron Kolb and follow UW alumnus Curtis Taylor. Taylor was chosen as our Distinguished Alumnus in 2011 for his continued work at Duke and else ware. Jacobs is expected to complete her PhD in Economics from Duke University this spring.
Our teaching professors are critical in the education mission of our department as they teach many of the larger courses such as ECON 200, and ECON 201, which are introductory courses in microeconomics and macroeconomics, respectively. These are the courses most frequently taken by non-major students, enabling the Department’s ability to provide economics courses for other majors.
The Department thanks everyone who helped recruiting those terrific candidates and especially the search committee members. For the assistant professor in macroeconomics: Yu-chin Chen, Chang-Jin Kim, Stephen Turnovsky, Eric Zivot. For the assistant teaching professor: Yanqin Fan, Haideh Salehi-Esfahani, Jacques Lawarree, and Dennis O’Dea. The Department looks forward to welcoming Brian and Joshua in the coming months.