Research

Selected Publications

Teaching

Dr. Tracy Mott

Education

PhD, Economics, Stanford University, 1982
MDiv, Union Theological Seminary, 1974
AB, Princeton University, 1968

Research

My research is generally concerned with extending the ideas of Micha³ Kalecki and John Maynard Keynes on the relation of financial considerations to economic activity, with philosophical and doctrine-historical aspects of Kaleckian and Keynesian economics, and with related topics in macroeconomics, monetary economics, and history of economics.  I am working on a book manuscript entitled "Kalecki's Principle of Increasing Risk and Keynesian Economics," under contract to Routledge.

Selected Publications

"On the Behavior of Money, Velocity, Prices, and Output in the UK in the Gold Standard Period: 1871-1913," with Hamid Baghestani, Applied Economics, December 2007.

"El Papel de los Mercados Financieros en Actividad Macroeconómica," ("The Role of Financial Markets in Macroeconomic Activity") in Políticas Macroeconómicos para Paises en Desarrollo, eds. Guadalupe Mántey and Noemi Levy, DGAPA-FES-Acatlán-UNAM, 2007, pp. 377-397.

Rethinking Capitalist Development: Essays on the Economics of Josef Steindl, edited by Nina Shapiro and myself, Routledge, 2005.

"Longer-Run Aspects of Kaleckian Macroeconomics" for Mark Setterfield, ed., The Economics of Demand-led Growth: Challenging the Supply-Side Vision of the Long Run, Edward Elgar, pp. 153-171, July 2002.

"Kenneth Boulding, 1910-1993," Economic Journal, June 2000, pp. 430-444.

"Kalecki Vs. Keynes on the Determinants of Investment," with Julio López, Review of Political Economy 11, July 1999, pp. 291-301.

Teaching

My teaching interests are in the areas of Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics, History and Philosophy of Economics, and Alternative Theories of Value and Distribution.  At DU in recent years I have normally taught the following courses: "Origins of Modern Economics," required for our MA students and open to junior and senior undergraduates, which covers the development and problems of classical and neoclassical value theory, neoclassical business cycle theories and Keynes's attempts to develop a different macroeconomics, and the implications of this for price theory; "Advanced Macroeconomic Theory," required for MA students, which covers the development and present state of the major theories of macroeconomics; and three sections of "Economics: Wealth and Poverty," our first course for undergraduates.  I have recently started offering in alternating years "Money and Financial Markets" and "Monetary Theory and Policy" for upper-division undergrads and MA students.

Service

I served as Chair of the Department from July 1995 to March 2001.  I am the Department's library liaison and seminar organizer.  I have served on several departmental and divisional promotion and tenure committees.  I have done some work for and made public appearances in support of local projects such as living wage initiatives in Denver and Boulder.  I have given a number of presentations and participated in public discussions for the local chapters of organizations such as the Colorado Progressive Coalition.  I have given a number of presentations in area high school classes on topics such as "Understanding Economics and the Economy," "Capitalism and Its Discontents," and "The Stock Market and the Economy" under the auspices of the Reach Out DU Program.

Dr. Robert Urquhart

Education

PhD Economics, New School for Social Research, New York, 1987.
MA Political Economy, New School for Social Research, New York, 1977.
BA, Hons. Philosophy, University College in the University of London, 1970.

Research

My research is directed by the double question: what is modern society, and how did it come to be the way it is? The problematic relationship between modernity and capitalism is crucial to answering this question; and a lot of my work has focused on the rise of political economy and its place in 18th-century culture, as offering a picture of a pre-capitalist modernity. My recent work has focussed especially on developing an adequate concept of individuality. It recognizes both that the individual is one of the most important creations of modern society, and that the relation between individual and society is necessarily problematic.

Selected Publications

Ordinary Choices: Individuals, Incommensurability, and Democracy, Routledge, 2005.

"Steuart's Method: Aristotelian Political Economy", in The Economics of Sir James Steuart, ed. Ramón Tortajada, Routledge, 1998.

 "David Hume and Josiah Tucker: Pagan and Christian Political Economy", History of Economic Ideas, 1996.

 "The Trade Wind, the Statesman, and the System of Commerce: Sir James Steuart's Vision of Political Economy", European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 1996.

"Reciprocating Monads: Individuals, The Wealth of Nations, and the Dream of Economic Science", Scottish Journal of Political Economy, vol. 41, no. 4, November 1994.

"Individuals, Property, and the Life of Liberty in the Political Thought of John Locke," Social Concept, 1985.

Teaching

My teaching begins with the history of economic thought, understood as a fundamental part of doing economic theory. My concern is with the philosophical and conceptual structures underlying the technical framework of economic theory, and the ways in which these form part of a broader cultural and historical context. I try to show the importance of the history of economic thought as a necessary critical element in economic theory, drawing on the tradition of critique as a central moment in the task of human liberation. Both my teaching and my research are inter-disciplinary, questioning the boundaries among the social sciences, and between the social sciences and the humanities.

Dr. Yavuz Yasar

Education

PhD Economics, University of Utah, 2004.
MSc Economics, University of Utah, 1998
BA Public Finance, Hacettepe University (Turkey), 1992.

Research

Fields of Specialization:

(1) Political Economy
 
(2) Econometrics

Fields of Interest and Research:

(1) Political Economy, History of Economic Thought, Macroeconomics and Money: Real-financial sector connection; Classical-Keynesian monetary analysis of market economies; effective demand and circulation of money; theories of production and money in Marx, Keynes, and Kalecki's writings.
 
(2) Health Economics, Social Policy, and Development Economics: Social determinants of and inequities in health; disparities in access to and utilization of health care services; organizational and financial aspects of health care systems; development and macroeconomics of social policy (especially health care and pensions).
 
(3) Teaching Economics: Developing a heterodox curriculum for undergraduate teaching of economics; integration of previous research areas into undergraduate and graduate level teaching economics.

Selected Publications

Turkey's Environment and Public Health in the Neoliberal Age: An Inconvenient Truth, Turkish Studies Association Journal (Forthcoming in Spring-2009).

Competition Among Health Plans and Women's Use of Preventive Care: A Multilevel Analysis, International Journal of Health Services (Forthcoming).

Circulation and Effective Demand: A Comment on Nell,, (with Mark Lautzenheiser) The Cambridge Journal of Economics, (July) Vol. 30, No: 4, pp. 651-656, 2006.

Teaching Macroeconomics by Bringing Marx into the Classroom, (with Mark Lautzenheiser) Review of Radical Political Economics (Summer) Volume 37, No. 3, pp. 329-339, 2005.

Dr. Katherine Freeman

Education 

B.A., Economics, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, May 1970

M.S., Economics, Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida, June 1973

Ph.D., Economics, Florida State University, March 1978

Research 

Microeconomic Theory, Macroeconomic Theory, Public Finance, Economic Development

Selected Publications 

"Motivational Needs and Interdependent Utilities", International Journal of Social Economics, 31, no. 5/6 (2004), pp.561-571.

"The Significance of McClelland's Achievement Variable in the Aggregate Production Function," Economic Development and Cultural Change, 24 (July 1976), pp. 815-824.

"The Significance of Psychological Motivation in Welfare Analysis," Abstracted in Atlantic Economic Journal, 7, No. 1 (March 1979).

"A Review of Economic Thought and Social Change," Southern Economic Journal, 47 (April 1981).

"The Significance of Motivational Variables in International Public Welfare Expenditures," Economic Development and Cultural Change, 32 (July 1984), pp.725-748.

"Reflections on Need Achievement and International Differences in Income Growth: 1950 - 1960," Economic Development and Cultural Change 33 (July 1985), pp. 865-877.

"The Significance of Motivational Variables in International Public Welfare Expenditures:  A Reply, " Economic Development and Cultural Change, (January 1988).

"The Images of Human Nature in Economics," International Review of Economics and Business/Rivista Internazionale Di Scienze Economiche E Commerciali, (August 1993), pp. 625-640. (Lead article)

"Utility Interdependence When Personality Types Interact", International Journal of Social Economics, 2, no. 2 (1995), pp. 4-18. (Lead article)

Teaching 

Microeconomic Theory, Macroeconomic Theory, Public Finance, Economic Development. Courses taught include Advanced Macroeconomic Theory, Intermediate Microeconomic Theory, Intermediate Macroeconomic Theory, Public Microeconomic Policy, Public Macroeconomic Policy, Welfare Economics, Public Finance, Fiscal and Monetary Policy, History of Economic Thought, Economics of Social Issues, Microeconomic Principles, Macroeconomic Principles.

Markus Schneider

Education:

PhD in Economics – New School for Social Research, NY (expected 2009)

MPhil in Economics – New School for Social Research, NY (2008)

Fundamentally, my research is focused on income inequality and explaining unequal labor market outcomes.  My approach is to look at techniques for distributional analysis developed by physicists and to evaluate whether these methods provide further insight to this basic topic.  The question my research addresses is whether models based on the interactions of rational agents and differences in human capital are sufficient to explain observed (and growing!) income inequality, or whether structural elements inherent to capitalism also play a role.  If so, can the role of these structural elements be deduced from the features of the observed distribution of wage and salary income?  Many labor market models seem ill-equipped to capture structural explanations and consequently suffer inadequacies when it comes to their distributional predictions compared to the observed distribution of incomes.  These inadequacies were highlighted by physicists, who are accustomed to linking distributional features in empirical data to particular generating mechanisms and implied classes of models.  My work explores the usefulness of their methods to economics and applies elements of it to the distribution of earned income in the U.S.  The focus on distributional analysis and model selection has led me to adopt and develop very particular econometric techniques, specifically analyses based on the principle of maximum entropy.

Publications:

Milberg, W., v. Arnim, R., Mahoney, M., and Schneider, M.; “Dynamic Gains from U.S. Services Offshoring: A Critical View” in Global Capitalism Unbound: Winners and Losers from Offshore Outsourcing, ed. Eva Paus; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007

Mahoney, M., Milberg, W., Schneider, M., and v. Arnim, R.; “Spurring Growth Dynamics from Services Offshoring”; SCEPA Policy Note, Feb. 2006

Working Papers:

“A Comparative Entropy Analysis of the Distribution of Wages and Salaries” 

Presented at the annual New School / UMass Graduate Student Workshop in 2008

“The Implications of Exponentially Distributed Incomes for Economics”

 “Of Bachelors and Bachelorettes: The Effects of Gender and Marital Status on the U.S.

Income Distribution from 1996 to 2006”

Presented at the annual New School / UMass Graduate Student Workshop in 2007

“Finding Evidence for Multiple Equilibria: A Bayesian Approach”

“Homeownership, Spillover and Neighborhood Formation” 

Presented at the annual Southern Economics Association meeting in 2005

Teaching:

In addition to the introductory “Economics: Wealth & Poverty”, I will be teaching the MA-core “Advanced Microeconomics” course and “Economterics” at the 3000-level.