Economics Lecture Series - audio

As chair of the Council of Economic Advisers (January 2009–September 2010), Christina Romer was one of the four economics principals who met with President Obama daily to design and guide the administration’s response to the Great Recession. She played a key role in macroeconomic policy, the rescue and reform of the financial system, health care reform, and budget policy. She was also a primary spokesperson on the economy for the administration, appearing frequently on the evening news, in the financial press, and on the Sunday morning news programs. An expert in economic history and macroeconomics, Romer is a leading scholar on the causes of the Great Depression and the impact of monetary and fiscal policy. She also is the recipient of numerous awards for her scholarship and teaching, including the prestigious Presidential Young Investigator Award from the National Science Foundation, a Simon P. Guggenheim fellowship, membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Distinguished Teaching Award at the University of California, Berkeley.

Severin Borenstein is E.T. Grether Professor of Business Administration and Public Policy at the Haas School of Business, director of the University of California Energy Institute, and co-director of the institute’s Center for the Study of Energy Markets.

Frank Wolak is Holbrook Working Professor of Commodity Price Studies in the economics department at Stanford University and chairman of the Market Surveillance Committee of the Independent System Operator for the electricity supply industry of California.

Lester B. Lave ’60 is University Professor and Higgins Professor of Economics at Carnegie Mellon University, with appointments in the business school, engineering school and the public policy school. Lave is also the director of the Carnegie Mellon Green Design Initiative and co-director of the Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center.

William W. Hogan, Raymond Plank Professor of Global Energy Policy at Harvard University, is the research director of the Harvard Electricity Policy Group, which explores the issues involved in the transition to a more competitive electricity market. While at Stanford University, Hogan founded the Energy Modeling Forum, and he has also served as president of the International Association for Energy Economics.