Justin Wolfers Faculty Profile

Justin Wolfers
Associate Professor of Business and Public Policy

PhD, Harvard University, 2001; AM, Harvard University, 2000; B.Ec, University of Sydney, 1994

Research Areas
Labor economics; macroeconomics; social policy; behavioral economics; political economy; law and economics

Recent Consulting
Behavioral finance, Sports betting, Prediction markets, NewsFutures, HedgeStreet, ProTrade

Current Projects
Uses and limitations of prediction markets; Happiness trends; Economic consequences of elections; Election forecasting; Measuring discrimination; Empirical analysis of the law.

Academic Positions Held
Wharton: 2004-present. Previous appointment: Stanford University (GSB)

Other Positions
Economist, Reserve Bank of Australia, 1994-2001

Career and Recent Professional Awards; Teaching Awards
Milken Institute Award for Distinguished Economic Research, 2002

Corporate and Public Sector Leadership 2005-2009
Advisory Board, HedgeStreet; Scientific Advisory Board, NewsFutures; Visiting Scholar, San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank; Faculty Research Fellow, National Bureau of Economic Research; Research Affiliate, Center for Economic Policy Research; Research Fellow, Insitute for the Study of Labor (IZA); Fellow, Center for the Study of Poverty and Inequality (Stanford).

Representative Publications
(with J. Donohue)
“Uses and Abuses of Empirical Evidence in the Death Penalty Debate.” Stanford Law Review 58 791-846 (December 2005).

“Did Unilateral Divorce Raise Divorce Rates? A Reconciliation and New Results.” American Economic Review 96(5) (December 2006).

“Partisan Impacts on the Economy: Evidence from Prediction Markets and Close Elections.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 122(2) (May 2007).

(with E. Zitzewitz)
“Prediction Markets.” Journal of Economic Perspectives (Spring 2004).

(with B. Stevenson)
"Bargaining in the Shadow of the Law: Divorce Laws and Family Distress." Quarterly Journal of Economics (February 2006).

(with G. Mankiw and R. Reis)
“Disagreement About Inflation Expectations.” NBER Macro Annual, 2003.

(with O. Blanchard)
“The Role of Shocks and Institutions in the Rise of European Unemployment: The Aggregate Evidence.” Economic Journal (March 2000).