Everything Economics at the University of Toronto
Understanding inflation demands the examination of both monetary policies put in place by central banks, and fiscal policies set by governments. That was one aspect of the 2024 Berkowitz Lecture delivered by 2011 Nobel Laureate Chris Sims. A faculty member at Princeton Sims is also a Fellow of the Econometric Society, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. [Read more…]
A current MFE student and a student who recently completed the program were recognized with awards at the 2024 Berkowitz Lecture on March 7th.
Joseph Hunter won the Varouj Aivazian Award. The award is named for Professor Aivazian, a former director of the MFE program, who teaches Economics at all three of the university’s campuses. The prize has been awarded to the first-year MFE student with the highest academic performance in the fall term since 2014. The 2024 winner is Joseph Hunter who is currently completing his internship with Sales and Trading at BMO Capital Markets.
“Joseph is the only person in his cohort that has earned a perfect 4.0 cGPA with 5 A+ grades to his name,” said Jeff Ferrer, Assistant Director of the MFE program. [Read more…]
Professor Adonis Yatchew and his research team are at the core of a new collaboration between the Ontario Energy Board and the University of Toronto’s Climate Positive Energy (CPE) Initiative. The budget for the project is $250,000 with the final report due to the OEB this summer.
The collaboration will see Professor Yatchew and his research team conduct a review of benchmarking methodologies — comparisons used to gauge the performance of Ontario electricity distributors — and how the performance is used to regulate pricing, and other factors related to the electricity system. The review will also identify new benchmarking methodologies that consider the emerging challenges to electricity distribution brought about by the broader energy transition.
“As climate change initiatives are increasingly introduced into energy systems, there tends to be upward pressure on costs,” Yatchew said. “Efficient regulation that enhances incentives for cost control has to be part of the larger picture of decarbonization efforts.” [Read more…]
The Bank of Canada has awarded two Department of Economics professors its Fellowship Award. Professors Michelle Alexopoulos and Diego Restuccia are recognized for their expertise and research into the national bank’s core functions: monetary policy, financial systems, currency, fund management, and retail payments supervision. The award has an annual value of $95,000 for a five-year renewable term. Both professors also received the award in 2019.
“It is always an honour for the Department of Economics to see our faculty recognized for their outstanding achievements in research and their contributions to Economics and its institutions,” said Professor Ettore Damiano, Department Chair. “Both Michelle and Diego are deserving of this recognition from the Bank of Canada and we are all thrilled to have two more reasons to celebrate them and the continuation of their work.”
Professor Alexopoulos is current President of the Canadian Economics Association. where her term of service has emphasized equity and inclusion through mentoring and networking programs. Her research examines the effects of technological evolution and disruption on the economy and labour markets and, among other methodologies, includes the innovative use of library classification systems for data mining and text analysis. [Read more…]
Be prepared to smile. The Front Desk of Happiness is coming to the Department of Economics. March 20th is the International Day of Happiness and Adriano Macedo, the events and office assistant with the department, has been studying the ups and downs of happiness and how to create it. He recently earned a certification in the Science of Well-being.
“By embracing the principles of happiness and well-being,” Macedo believes, “we align ourselves with a global movement towards creating happier and more positive environments.” [Read more…]