Department of Economics

Department of Economics

Founded in 1903, our department is well-known for the excellence of its teaching and advising, with a strong reputation for producing outstanding Ph.D. graduates, as well as rigorous and innovative economic research. We are consistently ranked among the world’s leading departments.

On the forefront in research

The impact Berkeley faculty have had on various fields of economics has been enormous. Our department is currently at the forefront of many exciting new developments in economics:

5 Nobel Prizes
5 John Bates Clark Medals
2 MacArthur Foundation Fellows
25 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowships (an average of one per year since 1995)
1 Fisher-Black Prize

Excellence in Teaching

Carol D. Soc Distinguished Graduate Student Mentoring Award: Professor David Card (2017); Professor Edward Miguel (2015).
Division of Social Sciences Distinguished Teaching Award: Professor Martha Olney (2016); Professor David Romer (2014).
Campus: Distinguished Teaching Award: Professor Ulrike Malmendier (2015)

Our roster just got bigger

This year we are pleased to add Professors Emi Nakamura and Jon Steinsson to our dynamic and diverse faculty.

Recent faculty hires include Dmitry Taubinsky and Supreet Kaur.

News and Announcements

"Generally, we either talk about growth or about inequality, but rarely about the two together," says Professor Gabriel Zucman in an interview with the Washington Center for Equitable Growth. "The distributional national accounts we’re constructing are an attempt at bridging the gap between macroeconomics, on the one hand, and inequality studies on the other hand." Read more

Berkeley Economics professor and former IMF Chief Economist Maury Obstfeld joins a discussion on the Trump administration’s decision to name China a currency manipulator. Listen to the podcast here.

Does electricity really help lift households out of poverty? Berkeley Economics Professor Ted Miguel and fellow researchers set out to answer this question with an experiment, first identifying a sample of ‘under grid’ households in Western Kenya — structures that are located close to but not connected to an electricity grid. Read more

Photo: REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya

Evidence from Latin America suggests that solely encouraging unattainable aspirations among poor households does not improve their welfare. Read more about the work of Berkeley Economics Professor Paul Gertler, with collaborators from the University of Maryland and the University of Chile.

Berkeley Economics Professor Martha Olney talks with Mary Suiter, assistant vice president and economic education officer at the St. Louis Fed, about her teaching success and why she mentors. She also discusses changing demographics in the field and how former Berkeley undergrad Alice Wu’s thesis took the profession by storm. Listen to the recorded interview [Via the St. Louis Fed]

"Location has become more important than ever before, especially for highly educated workers," says Berkeley Economics Professor Enrico Moretti, author of The New Geography of Jobs, in an interview with the Richmond Federal Reserve. "It is true that we can have access to a lot of information and communicate easily from everywhere in the world, but at the same time, location remains crucial for worker productivity and for economic success." Read more

Research and Teaching

We're proud to share that Berkeley Economics professors Emi Nakamura and Chris Shannon were elected to join The American Academy of Arts and Sciences, which recognizes the outstanding achievements of individuals in academia, the arts, business, government,and public affairs. Congratulations! To learn more about their work and of all UC Berkeley faculty members elected, read more.

We're thrilled to share that Berkeley Economics Prof. Emi Nakamura has been announced as the 2019 recipient of the John Bates Clark Medal! The prize is awarded to an American economist under the age of forty who is judged to have made the most significant contribution to economic thought and knowledge. Read more

Congratulations to Berkeley Economics professors, Philpp Strack and Gabriel Zucman, for winning the prestigious Sloan Research Fellowship! Read more.

Berkeley Economics Professor Yuri Gorodnichenko has been awarded 2018 Monetary Economics and Finance Prize, which distinguish researchers who have developed central concepts to improve our understanding of Monetary Economics and Finance. Read more

Economics Professors Supreet Kaur and Danny Yagan have been awarded 2018 Sloan Fellowships, which “honor early-career scholars whose achievements mark them as among the very best scientific minds working today."