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“To gain a student, eliminate a form,” writes Susan Dynarski for The New York Times

Aug 21, 2015

In this Sunday’s New York Times “Economic View,” Susan Dynarski explains why recent efforts to simplify the Fafsa, the financial aid application for aspiring college students, don’t go far enough. Dynarski’s prescription? Eliminate the form...

In the news, Stevenson talks My Brother's Keeper, min. wage, job licensing

Jul 31, 2015

Betsey Stevenson is helping to paint a picture of the stark reality surrounding racial and economic inequality in the United States. In a July 30 Yahoo Politics article, "Obama: Investing in minority men is not 'charity,' it's lucrative," Senior...

News

Internship field report, Grace Evans @ Detroit's Office of the Deputy Mayor for Economic Policy, Planning, and Strategy

Jul 30, 2015

Second year MPP candidate Grace Evans is spending her summer in the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Economic Policy, Planning, and Strategy in the City of Detroit. This new office was created by Mayor Mike Duggan in late 2014 as an effort to raise...

Widespread international media coverage for Dominguez Fed nomination

Jul 21, 2015

Hundreds of news stories around the globe focus on Ford School Professor Kathryn Dominguez as President Obama nominates her for an open seat on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. Here's a roundup of some of the recent posts. [View the story...

Kathryn Dominguez nominated to serve on Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors

Jul 20, 2015

President Obama said Monday he’ll nominate University of Michigan professor Kathryn Dominguez to serve on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.Dominguez is professor of public policy and economics at U-M and research associate at the...

Internship field report from Luis Salvador @ the United Nations ECLAC, Chile

Jul 20, 2015

Landing an internship at the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) was always a priority for me. ECLAC, which deals directly with an array of policy issues facing the region, is one of the most respected...

Betsey Stevenson on the June jobs report: new jobs, flat wages, falling labor force participation

Jul 10, 2015

The American economy added 223,000 jobs this month, but wages have not risen and labor force participation has fallen to its lowest level since 1977, according to the Department of Labor's June jobs report. As a member of President Obama's Council...

News

Wolfers takes on Greek financial crisis in latest NY Times Upshot

Jul 1, 2015

Amid the Greek financial crisis, heads have turned to experts like Justin Wolfers to help break down the complex economic factors that have led to the current situation. A professor of public policy and economics at the Ford School, Wolfers is known...

Sue Dynarski’s latest NYT TheUpshot column takes on income gap in college graduation

Jun 2, 2015

In a June 2 column in the New York Times, Ford School professor Susan Dynarski writes that “class trumps ability when it comes to college graduation.”Dynarski cites a recent publication from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), which...

In memoriam: Robert M. Stern, internationally renowned economist and trade economist

May 18, 2015

We are deeply saddened to report that Robert M. Stern, professor emeritus of economics and public policy, passed away yesterday after a week-long hospital stay for heart trouble.Bob joined the faculty of the University of Michigan in 1961 and the...

Dominguez talks China in Marketplace story comparing global economy today to 1993

Apr 22, 2015

Kathryn Dominguez lent her expertise in international financial markets to American Public Media’s Marketplace yesterday. In “Trade Agreement, then and now,” reporter Nancy Marshall-Genzer compared today’s global economy to the economy in 1993, the...

Dean Yang’s research featured in HuffPo story about increased access to banking in developing economies

Apr 15, 2015

Dean Yang’s research is featured in “More people in the developing world are getting bank accounts, but there’s an asterisk on that progress,” an article by Jonathan Cohn in today’s Huffington Post. Cohn is referring to a new report from the World...

Preventing vote-selling in the Philippines image

New York Review of Books features Sheldon Danziger’s Legacies of the War on Poverty

Apr 7, 2015

This April, Christopher Jencks reviews Sheldon Danziger’s Legacies of the War on Poverty (Russell Sage, 2013) in a two-part series for The New York Review of Books. Jencks says Legacies’ chapters are “packed with evidence, make judicious judgments,...

Wolfers takes aim at recent study claiming parenting time doesn’t matter

Apr 2, 2015

In his latest New York Times Upshot editorial, Justin Wolfers took aim at a recent study on parenting time by mothers that has garnered widespread national media coverage. The study, “Does the Amount of Time Mothers Spend With Children or...

Ford School students host annual US-Canada conference

Mar 31, 2015

The 6th annual Ford+SPPG Conference took place earlier this month at Joan and Sanford Weill Hall in Ann Arbor. The event brings together MPP candidates from the Ford School and the University of Toronto’s School of Public Policy and Governance...

News

Hausman examines economic impacts of recent shale gas boom in Brookings paper

Mar 23, 2015

Welfare and distributional implications of shale gas, a paper by Catie Hausman, provides the first estimates of broad-scale welfare and distributional implications of the recent shale gas boom. The report, coauthored with U-M economics professor...

“We’re frighteningly in the dark about student debt” writes Dynarski for The New York Times

Mar 21, 2015

The United States government has a portfolio of roughly $1 trillion in student loans, many of which appear to be troubled writes Susan Dynarski in the business section of the Sunday New York Times. Dynarski’s column, “We’re frighteningly in the dark...

Microfinance study: Yang finds people may give more generously when they can choose what their dollars purchase

Mar 17, 2015

At a microfinance bank in Maputo, Mozambique, Dean Yang and colleagues engaged clients in a lab-in-the-field experiment with interesting implications for those who care about increasing the number and level of remittances, the financial...

Dynarski on how to boost graduation rates at community colleges

Mar 12, 2015

In this year’s State of the Union address, President Obama put forth a plan to make a student’s first two years of community college free. But is that plan viable? Susan Dynarski sees problems that must be fixed before it can conceivably work.“How...

Dean Yang publishes findings from randomized study of microsavings’ impact on agriculture, poverty

Mar 5, 2015

“Agriculture in Sub-Saharan Africa employs two-thirds of the labor force and generates about one-third of GDP growth,” writes Dean Yang in the introduction to “Facilitating savings from agriculture: field experimental evidence from Malawi,” a...

Ford Case Competition winners present to East Lansing City Council

Feb 20, 2015

At the East Lansing City Council’s February 17 meeting, five first year Ford School masters students, winners of the inaugural Ford Case Competition, presented to the council their proposal to resolve the city’s downtown parking concerns. The city,...

Dean Yang explores policies to increase the development impacts of migration for World Bank

Feb 12, 2015

“Evidence on Policies to Increase the Development Impacts of International Migration,” co-written by Dean Yang, has been published in the World Bank Research Observer. Posted on January 20, Yang and co-author David McKenzie of the World Bank aim to,...

Do placement exams bar students from higher ed? McFarlin says no. Read Education Week story

Feb 5, 2015

Education Week highlights Isaac McFarlin Jr.’s latest study in “Failing a Placement Exam Does Not Discourage College Enrollment,” posted by Caralee Adams on January 15.“State test cited in lower college enrollments,” a 1995 Dallas Morning News...

saac McFarlin discusses his research on Texas Top 10 Percent Plan with NPR image

“Gains from Economic Recovery Still Limited to Top One Percent,” says Justin Wolfers

Jan 30, 2015

“By this measure, the concentration of income among the richest Americans remains at levels last seen nearly a century ago,” says Justin Wolfers in his January 27, New York Times Upshot column, “Gains From Economic Recovery Still Limited to Top One...

Dynarski talks education and tax reform with LA Times

Jan 30, 2015

The White House is backing down on a minor provision detailed in the Obama administration’s tax reform proposals, but Susan Dynarski doesn’t think that provision should be given up on so easily. The Los Angeles Times’ Kathleen Hennessy writes...

Wolfers testifies before Senate Finance Committee on Jobs and Economic Growth

Jan 22, 2015

Justin Wolfers testified before the Senate Finance Committee today in a hearing on jobs and the economy. Wolfers spoke to the country’s economic recovery, long-term unemployment, and the need for increased investment in education (video here).He...

Justin Wolfers testifying before a congressional committee

Stevenson cited in coverage of Obama’s push for paid sick leave for workers

Jan 18, 2015

Betsey Stevenson was cited in numerous stories the past several days regarding the Obama Administration’s push to require companies to give workers up to seven days of paid sick leave each year.Stevenson, currently on leave from the Ford School,...

Justin Wolfers on the research, how pay increases influence and increase productivity

Jan 14, 2015

“Economists have long argued that increases in worker pay can lead to improvements in productivity—indeed, that it can actually be profitable to pay workers higher wages,” write Justin Wolfers and Jan Zilinsky in “Higher wages for low-income workers...

Obama’s college proposal a bid to rev the economy says Wolfers

Jan 10, 2015

“If [Obama] succeeds in persuading more of the next generation to continue beyond high school…there’s a strong chance the rate of economic growth will be bolstered for decades to come,” says Justin Wolfers in his January 9, New York Times Upshot...

Efforts to weaken financial reform will continue to emerge warns Barr

Jan 8, 2015

Michael Barr suspects Republicans will continue to target aspects of Dodd-Frank writes Eric Garcia of MarketWatch in the January 7 story, “House rejects bill granting banks more time to comply with Volker.” This Wednesday, the House voted on a...