All Else Equal
By Jason and Forrest
This podcast's goal is to bridge the gap between student inquiry and the world class expertise available from Notre Dame's economics and business faculty in real time.
Each podcast episode will focus on a student submitted question. Using students' questions as the vehicle for inquiry, we will find ND's leading experts on the subjects and have concise discussions with them regarding current issues.
All Else EqualSep 18, 2020
Episode 31: Sales & Trading, Info-tainment, and Roca News w/ Cole Folwell
We sat down and talked with Cole Folwell a 2019 Notre Dame, Political Science graduate. Cole's path as a trader at Citi is far from traditional. He talks about his experiences at Citi and how that's helped him to transition into his new role at Roca news. As Head of Growth for Roca, Cole talks to us about the state of news today and why he felt compelled to right the ship with Roca.
If you'd like to learn more about Roca news you can click the link to get started reading their newsletter.
You can also follow them on their Instagram page
Music sampled from Jay-Z - Blueprint (Momma loves you)
Episode 30: Germany's Russian Gas Problem w/ Rudi Bachmann
Rudi Bachmann is the Stepan Family College Professor of Economics at Notre Dame.
Recently, he co-authored a paper, https://www.econtribute.de/RePEc/ajk/ajkpbs/ECONtribute_PB_028_2022.pdf, that gained a lot of traction on Twitter. We sat down with Rudi to discuss the paper and Germany's reliance on Russian energy.
VoxEu Article regarding the paper
Music sampled from Big K.R.I.T. - King Pt. 4
Episode 29: International Intervention in the Ukraine Crisis - Breaking Down Economic Sanctions w/Zach Stangebye
All Else Equal listeners.....we're back.
We thought it was appropriate to dust off the mic and dissect the Ukraine crisis and the economic sanctions levied on Russia.
Zach Stangebye is the Quinn and Jean Stepan Assistant Professor of Economics at Notre Dame. He received his doctorate in economics from the University of Pennsylvania in 2015. He is a macroeconomist specializing in macroeconomic and international finance. The bulk of his research focuses on international financial crises originating in sovereign debt markets, with a particular emphasis on coordination failures across time.
Music sampled from UGK (Underground Kingz) - Int'l Players Anthem
Episode 28: Accompaniment and learning to walk together w/Steve Reifenberg
Steve Reifenberg is an associate professor of the practice of international development and co-director of the Integration Lab (i-Lab). He also is senior strategic advisor and faculty fellow of the Kellogg Institute for International Studies at the University of Notre Dame.
Reifenberg’s current research project, “From Aid to Accompaniment,” explores international development as a process of accompaniment. In his teaching about development, he is interested in interactive pedagogical approaches such as engaging students with international development “clients.”
Before coming to Notre Dame in February 2010, Reifenberg worked for nearly two decades on international education, negotiation and development issues at Harvard University.
From 1996 to 2002, Reifenberg served as the Executive Director of Harvard’s David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies. In 2002, he established Harvard’s first-ever university-wide office overseas in Santiago, Chile, an office that he directed for seven years.
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As Forrest announced, our summer book club will be Jim Otteson's "Seven Deadly Economic Sins". Be prepared for some special guests joining us over the summer to talk!
Music sampled from J. Cole - Let go my hand
Episode 27: The economics of evictions and the effects of housing policy w/ Rob Collinson
Rob Collinson is the Wilson Family LEO Assistant Professor in the Economics Department at the University of Notre Dame and the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO).
He is an applied microeconomist with research interests in housing policy, urban policy, and the design of anti-poverty programs. He completed his Ph.D. from New York University.
Music sampled from Outkast - Elevators
Episode 26: We feel the need, the need for speed. High frequency trading w/ John Shim
John Shim is an Assistant Professor of Finance at the University of Notre Dame. His research focuses on empirical asset pricing, market microstructure, and financial market design. His work on high-frequency trading and the design of stock exchanges has been featured in Bloomberg, the Financial Times, the Economist, and has been discussed by the SEC Chair and the New York Attorney General. He received his B.S. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and his MBA and PhD from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
Music sampled from Mos Def - Speed Law
Episode 25: The Federal Reserve's dual mandate and their impacts on wealth inequality w/Jeff Campbell
Jeff Campbell is the Frances D. Rasmus and Jerome A. Castellini Professor of Economics. Before coming to Notre Dame, he served as Senior Economist and Research Advisor at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. His research covers macroeconomics, industrial organization, and econometrics. Much of Jeff's research applies dynamic game theory to create tractable econometric models of strategic interactions between "large players," such as central banks and dominant firms in concentrated industries
Here is the NY Fed paper which prompted this discussion with Jeff.
If you want to learn more about Hugo van Buggenum
Music sampled from MF DOOM - Beef Rap
Episode 24: GameStop, order flow, and Bernie Madoff w/ Robert Battalio
Robert Battalio is currently a professor of Finance at the University of Notre Dame. Robert has also served on the faculty of Georgia State University, as a visiting academic at the Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank, and as the first NASD visiting academic fellow.
Robert has consulted for Fidelity, the New York Stock Exchange, LaBranche, Goldman Sachs, NYFIX, NASDR, the Nasdaq Intermarket, Archipelago, Susquehanna, and Knight Securities. His primary area of interest involves the relationship between financial market design and trading costs. He is currently studying whether the post-earnings announcement drift survives transactions costs, who trades on accruals information, trading costs in the equity option market, and price discovery in option markets. Robert’s work has appeared in the Journal of Finance, the Journal of Financial Economics, and the Review of Financial Studies, among others. Robert has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, the Dallas Morning News, the Newark Star Ledger, Inc Magazine, Business Week On-Line, the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Wall Street Letter, Christian Science Monitor, CNNfn, USA Today, Barrons, and Securities Week.
GameStop's Shift to Dark Trading
Jim Angel's paper Gamestonk: What happened and what to do about it
Netflix's Challenger and the very awesome academic paper discussing the Challenger explosion and market efficiency
Music sampled from Saweetie - Tap In
Episode 23: The good, the bad, and the ugly of economics w/ Jim Sullivan
On this week's episode, we talk to Jim Sullivan. Professor Sullivan is the Gilbert F. Schaefer College Professor of Economics at Notre Dame. He has been a visiting scholar at the National Poverty Center and a visiting professor at the University of Chicago, Harris School. His research examines the consumption, saving, and borrowing behavior of poor households, and how welfare and tax policy affects the well-being of the poor. In 2012, with fellow Notre Dame Professor William Evans, Professor Sullivan founded the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO). LEO is a research center that works with service providers to identify effective and replicable solutions to reduce poverty in America.
Our conversation discusses economics as a social engineering tool and we try to understand where does economics go right, where is it doing okay, and where can economics do better.
For more on Jim's work visit his Google Scholar Page
For more information about LEO
Music sampled from Outkast- SpottieOttieDopaliscious
Episode 22: Unpacking the opioid crisis w/ Ethan Lieber
Ethan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at Notre Dame. He is a prolific researcher on all things opioids and uses his vast understanding in both his undergraduate Principles of Economics class and his graduate-level Health Economics class.
Music sampled from D12- Purple Pills
Episode 21: To be (an economics major) or not to be w/Alison Levey
Alison is an alum of and former associate director of advising services in the Mendoza College of Business at Notre Dame. Currently, she splits her time authoring children's books, like "Ready Regan?", and hosting the podcast "The Open Book Test", where she talks to recent Notre Dame grads to discuss why they made the decisions they did as to major, career path etc. and together they reflect on how that all worked out.
Music sampled from Nas - The World is Yours
Episode 20: GameStop, meme stocks, and wallstreetbets w/Tommy Pero and Spencer Koehl
Spencer and Tommy are Notre Dame undergrads studying economics and finance. Aside from their roles at the Idea Center, they are sometimes TAs, and all the time music connoisseurs. They produce a weekly roundup of bit size news pieces. If you're interested in signing up for Nuggies (which you should be!) you can follow the link below.
Music sampled from Kanye West - Diamonds are Forever
Episode 19: Angrynomics part 4 w/ special guest John Winston
We dive into the fifth and final dialogue of Angrynomics and...alleviate our anger?
Thanks for listening everyone!!!
Music sampled from Kanye West and Kid Cudi - Reborn.
Episode 18: Angrynomics part 3 w/ special guest John Winston
We dive into the fourth dialogue of Angrynomics and....redistribute our anger amongst ourselves?
Music sampled from Kid Cudi - Just what I am.
Episode 17: Angrynomics part 2 w/ special guest John Winston
We dive into the third dialogue of Angrynomics and....get angry ourselves?
Music sampled from Jay Electric - Exhibit A
Episode 16: Angrynomics part 1 w/ special guest John Winston
It's part 1 of our long-awaited inaugural book club. It's a long one, so buckle up settle in, and grab your book. We're talking about Angrynomics.
In the episode, we mention a few resources. You can find the links below
- Gentzkow and Shapiro (2010) “What Drives Media Slant?” - https://web.stanford.edu/~gentzkow/research/biasmeas.pdf
- Jonathan Haidt “Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Righteous_Mind
- Russ Roberts “The Numbers Game: The Paradox of Household Income” - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DU2IT8rl6c
Episode 15: Wrapping up the election, the semester, and introducing the book club w/ Stephen Vukovits
Stephen Vukovits is a senior here at ND majoring in economics and is the co-president of the Federal Reserve and Fiscal Policy Challenge Club on campus.
Book Club Details
The first rule of Book Club is to TELL EVERYONE ABOUT BOOK CLUB
- We're reading Angrynomics by Mark Blyth and Eric Lonergan
- We will have on some special guests to dive into the book
- Over the next 9-10 weeks we will be releasing episodes relating to the 5 parts of the book
- Episode 1 will cover the first two parts of the book
Episode 14: A day in the life of a LEO research associate (including an existential crisis) w/ Emily Merola
Emily ensures research projects move forward successfully alongside the leadership of research faculty. She works with partners to initiate research designs, collects and analyzes data for each project, and prepares results for future audiences. Emily earned her BA in Economics from the University of Notre Dame. Before joining the LEO team full-time, she interned as one of LEO’s undergraduate research assistants.
Understanding returns to GED: paper 1 and paper 2
Music sampled from Eminem - Loose Yourself
Episode 13: Signaling, Human Capital, and Innovation w/ Kirk Doran
Kirk Doran is the Henkels Family Collegiate Chair and Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Notre Dame. Doran's research focuses on issues in labor economics, innovation economics, and international migration, with a particular focus on human capital complementarities. His work has examined the implications of large migrations of top scientists on the productivity and knowledge generation of their peers. Recent work has focused on the role of externalities, collaboration, and geographic distance in knowledge production, the impact of top prizes on the intellectual content of their recipient's work, and the impact of highly skilled immigrants on firms which randomly receive them.
Episode 12: Discussing politics and religion in polite company w/ David Campbell
David Campbell is the Packey J. Dee Professor of American Democracy at the University of Notre Dame and the chairperson of the political science department. His most recent book is Seeking the Promised Land: Mormons and American Politics (with John Green and Quin Monson). He is also the co-author (with Robert Putnam) of American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, which has been described by the New York Times as intellectually powerful, by America as an instant classic and by the San Francisco Chronicle as the most successfully argued sociological study of American religion in more than half a century. American Grace has also received both the 2011 Woodrow Wilson Award from the American Political Science Association for the best book on government, politics, or international affairs and the Wilbur Award from the Religious Communicators Council for the best non-fiction book of 2010.
American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us
Music sampled from Spillage Village - End of Dayz
Episode 11: Discussing MMT and the National Debt w/ Rudi Bachmann
Rüdiger Bachmann's academic career includes an assistant professorship at the University of Michigan, full professorships at the RWTH Aachen University and Frankfurt University, as well as visiting professorships at the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard University and Boston University. Bachmann’s research area is macroeconomics, where he specializes in the macroeconomics of heterogeneous agents. He is also interested in the implications of uncertainty and expectation formation on macroeconomic outcomes. His research has been published in the American Economic Review, the Journal of Monetary Economics, the American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, the Review of Economic Dynamics, Quantitative Economics, Economics Letters, and Economic Theory. At Notre Dame he teaches undergraduate and graduate classes in macroeconomics.
Music sampled from Dr. Dre - Nuthin' but a g thang
Episode 10: Spilling the Tea on Fiscal Relief and Stimulus w/ Mitchell Larson and Michael McElroy
Mitchell Larson is a senior studying Economics and Applied & Computational Math & Statistics at the University of Notre Dame where he serves as co-President of the Federal Reserve and Fiscal Challenge Club. A lifelong interest in dysfunctional relationships led him to be interested in Congress, the most dysfunctional group of them all, and that dysfunction’s effect on fiscal policy.
Michael McElroy is a junior at the University of Notre Dame pursuing a degree in Economics, with a supplementary major in Applied and Computational Mathematics and Statistics and a minor in the College of Arts and Letters Honors Program. He is an active member of the Federal Reserve and Fiscal Challenge Club.
Music sampled from D12 - American Psycho
Episode 9: Talking Shop - How Should We Teach Economics? w/ Mary Flannery
Prior to her appointment as Associate Dean for Undergraduate Studies, Mary served as the Associate Chair and Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Economics Department. Her current research interests are economics pedagogy and the telecommunications industry. Dean Flannery received her B.A. and M.A in Economics from the University of Notre Dame in 1978 and 1979 respectively and her Ph.D. from the University of Maryland in 1996.
Raj Chetty's “Using Big Data to Solve Economic and Social Problems Course”
Vox's article on changing the way we teach undergrad economics
Music sampled from Mos Def - Mathematics
Episode 8: How LEO and Notre Dame are Eliminating Poverty in America w/ Heather Reynolds
Heather Reynolds is the Managing Director for the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO) at the University of Notre Dame. LEO aims to identify the innovative, effective and scalable programs that help people move out of poverty. Reynolds drives LEO's strategic plan, which seeks to influence poverty policy and support the culture of evaluation among service providers to the poor nationwide.
Reynolds has extensive experience in strategic planning, fundraising, and social enterprise. She’s an expert speaker on poverty - both the modern issues and the new solutions - as well as nonprofit strategy. And as a woman who never stops seeking fresh solutions, Reynolds pioneered Catholic Charities Fort Worth’s research initiatives.
Through top-tier impact evaluations, LEO aims to identify the innovative, effective and scalable programs that help people move out of poverty. LEO’s research is conducted by faculty from the University of Notre Dame as well as scholars from across the country with expertise in designing and evaluating the impact of domestic anti-poverty programs. Their research initiatives span a wide range of poverty focus areas.
If you'd like to reach out about undergraduate opportunities with LEO, please contact Brady Ruffing at Brady.C.Ruffing.5@nd.edu.
LEO's undergraduate research assistants
Music sampled from Outkast - Aquemini
Episode 7: Understanding the Ideas Behind the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics w/ Lakshmi Iyer
Lakshmi Iyer is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Notre Dame. Her primary research fields are development economics and political economy, with a special emphasis on property rights and the distribution of political power within societies. Her research has examined many dimensions of the distribution of political power within emerging market countries, including the legacy of colonial rule, the division of authority between politicians and bureaucrats, and the determinants of conflict. She is currently working on several projects related to the determinants and consequences of women’s political participation.
At Notre Dame, Lakshmi Iyer teaches an undergraduate course on “Political Economy of Development.”
Keough School of Global Affairs
International Development Studies Minor
Papers and resources mentioned in the episode
Music sampled from DTP re-mixed by Jhonny Charles - Growing Pains
Episode 6: What the Heck is Average Inflation Targeting? w/ Eric Sims
Eric Sims is a professor of economics at Notre Dame, where he has taught since 2009. He is a macroeconomist whose research focuses on business cycles and monetary and fiscal policies. His research has been published in the American Economic Review, the American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, the Journal of Monetary Economics, the Review of Economics and Statistics, and several other scholarly journals. He is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and also serves as a research consultant to the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
At Notre Dame he teaches classes in macroeconomics and monetary policy at both the undergraduate and graduate levels and is a past recipient of the Rev. Edmund P. Joyce, C.S.C. Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. He has also co-authored an online textbook for use in intermediate macroeconomics courses.
Episode 5: The Ethics of College Football and Amateurism w/ Brian Levey
Brian Levey joined the Mendoza faculty in 2007 after a twenty-year legal career, most recently focused on building corporate ethics and compliance programs. He currently teaches the introductory undergraduate business law course, as well as several ethics classes in the undergraduate, graduate and executive programs. Levey is a recipient of the Rev. Edmund P. Joyce, C.S.C., Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, as well as the Master of Science in Accountancy Dincolo Outstanding Professor Award. In 2016, he was named a faculty fellow at Notre Dame's Kaneb Center for Teaching and Learning.
Prior to joining the college of business, Brian was Fannie Mae's vice president for ethics and was the director of compliance and business ethics with Smiths Group plc. Previously, Levey was a deputy ethics officer and associate counsel with MCI (formerly WorldCom and now Verizon Business)
Alison Levey's amazing children's book: Ready Regan
Music sampled from 2 Chainz - NCAA
Episode 4: Consumer Behavior in the time of COVID-19 w/ Emily Garbinsky and Mitch Olsen
Emily N. Garbinsky is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at the University of Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business. As a consumer psychologist, she studies how and when money can increase happiness - finding that money can positively impact happiness, consumption enjoyment, and relationship satisfaction depending on how it is managed, saved, and spent. Her empirical approach includes primary data collection, such as lab and field experiments, as well as secondary data analysis of bank transaction records and publicly available longitudinal surveys. Her research highlights how various consumer financial decisions can impact happiness by focusing on three streams of research: 1) understanding financial decision-making within romantic couples, 2) motivating individual consumers to make wiser choices with their money, and 3) helping consumers to spend money in ways that will increase their enjoyment of consumption experiences.
New York Times Article featuring Emily on Income Infidelity
Mitchell Olsen is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at the University of Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business. His research interests are in marketing strategy, with a specific focus on substantive issues that occur at the intersection of any, and all, of the following sub-areas: (1) Brands, (2) Innovation, and (3) ‘Green’ (i.e., environmentally sustainable) marketing strategies. Across these areas, his research program primarily focuses on how managers’ new product-related actions impact the brand, itself. For instance, an article he published in the Journal of Marketing demonstrates how “green” new product introductions impact consumers’ attitudes toward the brand.
Music sampled from Raekwon (and Method Man) - Ice Cream
Episode 3: Grading Notre Dame's Reopening w/ Chris Cronin
Christopher C.W. Cronin is an applied microeconomist with research interests in health economics. His current projects focus on the impact of stay-at-home mandates during the covid-19 crisis, the relationship between health insurance and medical care demand, the determinants of health facility choice, and individuals' choices relating to obesity. He specializes in the estimation of dynamic microeconometric models.
Recent research in the NY Times
During this episode Forrest referred to Erin Hoffman-Harding - ND Vice President of Student Affairs - as Erin Hoffmore-Harding. This was mainly Jason's fault because he was making funny faces across the desk at Forrest at the time. Our bad Erin.
Music sampled from Dreamville - Sacrifices
Episode 2: Is the Stock Market Really that Different from the Main Street Economy w/ Colin Jones
Colin Jones is an Associate Teaching Professor of Finance, specializing in applied investments. Prior to joining Mendoza, he was a Clinical Associate Professor of Finance at the University of South Carolina, where he served as director of the Carolina Finance Scholars Program, director of the Student Managed Investment Fund, and director of the Carolina Finance & Investment Association. He received the Alfred G. Smith Jr. Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2016, and was named the Michael A. Hill Professor of the Year in 2018. He is co-author of the digital introductory textbook A Living Introduction to Finance, a real-time learning platform that has saved students over a million dollars on textbooks while improving the efficacy of introductory courses across the country.
Wall Street Journal article exploring this phenomenon (more) (more x2)
Music sampled from J Cole - The Climb Back
Episode 1: Reopening Schools in the Time of COVID-19 w/ Chloe Gibbs
Chloe Gibbs joined Notre Dame's economics department in 2015, where she is also a faculty affiliate of the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities. Professor Gibbs is interested in measuring the effects, both intended and unintended, of policies and programs targeted at disadvantaged children and families. Her recent research includes analyzing the impact of full-day kindergarten on cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes using experimental and quasi-experimental methods, investigating the intergenerational transmission of Head Start effects, and exploring whether fade out of early childhood effects varies with preschool and early school experiences.
Chloe on Probable Causation podcast
Music sampled from Kanye West - School Spirit