DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

For her groundbreaking insights into the history of the American economy, the evolution of gender roles and the interplay of technology, human capital and labor markets. Claudia Goldin is the Henry Lee Professor of Economics at Harvard University. She was the director of the NBER’s Development of the American Economy program from 1989 to 2017 and was recently appointed as co-director of the NBER’s group on Gender in the Economy.

Heller received a bachelor’s degree in economics and computer studies from Northwestern and an MBA from Kellogg. In 2019, Heller received the Northwestern Alumni Medal, the highest honor bestowed by the Northwestern Alumni Association.

Zhou, currently a senior at Northwestern University, leads Mock On, an online mock trial academy for high schoolers. As a collegiate mock trial competitor himself and the president of Northwestern's Mock Trial team, he knows the ins and out of the activity. But when Covid-19 hit, his mock trial season was cut short. Knowing that other students were facing the same issue, he launched Mock On in May and has since hosted two online Zoom camps. More than 50 students from around the U.S. have signed up and learned about the mock trial process.

The U.S. unemployment rate fell to 7.9 percent last month, a substantial improvement from the nearly 15 percent mark it hit in April, but significantly worse than other advanced economies around the world. Germany’s comparable unemployment rate, for example, peaked at 4.4 percent. For years, economists have debated whether the United States does enough to help its unemployed. The pandemic recession — the worst downturn the world has seen in nearly a century — has given a new sense of urgency to the discourse.

When meeting people freshman fall, we all get pretty good at the quick introduction of names and major. I kept getting the same follow-up question: “Oh, you’re a neuro major. Are you pre-med?” I could have just said yes and left it at that, I suppose.

Women helped pull the U.S. economy out of the last recession. This time around they are falling behind. The pandemic is disproportionately affecting women and threatening to wipe out decades of their economic progress. As the crisis drags on, some of the biggest pain points are among women of color and those with young children. These setbacks — characterized by some economists as the nation’s first female recession — stand in sharp contrast to the dramatic progress women made in the expansion following the last financial crisis. The jobs, income and promotions that women lose as a result of the coronavirus could hold back economic growth and sideline an entire generation of women.

This is a follow-up to her PNAS paper on the mental health impacts of school shootings called "Local exposure to school shootings and youth antidepressant use"

In the 18th century, something sparked a wave of technological innovation and economic growth that has transformed the world for the better. Economists have argued about what that something was ever since. Our guest today, Professor Joel Mokyr, argues that it was a change in western European cultural attitudes that provided that spark. Enlightenment curiosity fomented a belief that practical knowledge could improve the world in tangible and permanent ways. Do we assume that progress will always happen? What threatens the concept of progress?

In the last two decades, over 240,000 American students were on school grounds when a gunman opened fire at their school. While public attention often focuses on the victims who were killed, less is known about the impacts of school shootings on surviving youth. This study represents the largest analysis to date of the effects of school shootings on an important indicator of youth mental health: the use of prescription antidepressants. We find that local exposure to fatal school shootings leads to persistent and significant increases in youth antidepressant use. These impacts are smaller in areas with a higher density of mental health providers who focus on behavioral interventions.