THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
ALVAREZ, NEAL, AND GREENSTONE RECEIVE NAMED; DISTINGUISHED PROFESSORSHIPS (2019)
PUBLISHED ON JAN 4, 2019
The Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics is pleased to announce three of our faculty have received named professorships or were appointed distinguished service professors, effective January 1st.
Fernando Alvarez has been named the inaugural Saieh Family Professor in the Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics and the College. He is a macroeconomist whose research focuses on dynamic general equilibrium models applied to asset pricing, international trade, labor market search and insurance, holdings of liquid assets, and nominal rigidities in price settings. He was elected a Fellow of the Econometric Society in 2008, and in 2018 elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.
Michael Greenstone has been named the Milton Friedman Distinguished Service Professor in the Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics and the College. Greenstone directs the Becker Friedman Institute and the interdisciplinary Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago. His research appears in leading economics and scientific journals and has influenced policy globally. The primary motivation of his research is the global energy challenge that aims to balance society’s need for inexpensive and reliable energy for robust economic growth, without unduly harming human health or the environment or increasing the probability of disruptive climate change. He previously served as the Chief Economist for the White House Council of Economic Advisers, where he co-led the development of the United States Government’s social cost of carbon. Greenstone also directed The Hamilton Project, which studies policies to promote economic growth, and has since joined its Advisory Council. He is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a fellow of the Econometric Society, and a former editor of the Journal of Political Economy.
Derek Neal has been named the William C. Norby Professor in the Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics and the College. Shortly after arriving at UChicago, Neal began work on a series of papers that document the causes and consequences of basic skill gaps that develop between black and white youth as they progress through childhood and early adolescence. Over the past decade, he has also worked on the design of incentive and accountability systems for educators. Further, Neal is examining the links between home and school experiences of youth and future outcomes in inequality, the labor market, and the criminal justice system. In 2016, Neal received the prestigious Llewellyn John and Harriet Manchester Quantrell Awards for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching; awarded annually since 1938, this award is the nation's oldest prize in undergraduate teaching. In 2018, he published "Information, Incentives and Education Policy," (Harvard University Press) the first monograph in the Sanford J. Grossman Lectures in Economics Series.