Economics

Associate professors Laura Young and Sacha Gelfer co-lead Bentley’s Wall Street 101 program on macroeconomics and financial markets. The program teaches high school students about the relationship between the U.S. economy and global financial markets, and how financial markets respond to current events about inflation, interest rates, economic data, and monetary and fiscal policy decisions. Laura and Sacha lead the students through trading simulations, portfolio-building competitions, role-playing as policymakers and macroeconomic debates.

In a paper published in the Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, professor Jeff Livingston (above, left) and Bentley alumnus Rustam Rasulmukhamedov ’20 (right) take a closer look at “dictator games,” in which a solo player shares money with an anonymous partner. After learning that players cease funding when given the option to take money away from the partner, Rustam wondered what would happen if the partner was a charity instead of an individual. Together, Jeff and Rustam found that people give just as much to charities when the take option is added, showing that people are altruistic when supporting causes they believe in.

This spring, assistant professor Benjamin Chartock taught a “Microeconomics of Health Care” course for students enrolled in the Bentley-Beth Israel Lahey Health executive MBA program. The classroom synergies between Ben’s extensive training in the economics of health care and the students’ knowledge of the health care industry are already paying dividends. Ben will be collaborating with leading clinicians at the Smith Center at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center to use cutting edge econometric methods to gain insight into important health care-related questions.