39 Facts About Edward Lazear

Edward Paul Lazear was an American economist, the Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and the Davies Family Professor of Economics at Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Edward Lazear has been called the founder of personnel economics a field of economics that applies economic models to the study of the management of human resources in the firm.

Edward Lazear is credited with developing a theory of entrepreneurship and leadership that emphasizes skill acquisition.

Edward Lazear was born on August 17,1948, in New York City.

Edward Lazear grew up in Brooklyn, New York, before moving to Los Altos, California.

Edward Lazear's father was a shipyard worker during World War II, and had been a janitor at a hospital, while his mother was a salesperson at a jewelry shop.

Edward Lazear graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles, with AB and AM degrees in 1971.

Edward Lazear's wife said he struggled at first, until he took an economics course and did well.

Edward Lazear received his doctorate in economics from Harvard University in 1974.

Edward Lazear began his career in 1974 at the University of Chicago School of Business as an assistant professor.

Edward Lazear went on to be the Gladys J Brown Professor of Urban and Labor Economics from 1985 to 1992.

Edward Lazear worked here for twenty years before joining the faculty of the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Edward Lazear had been the Morris A Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution since 1985.

Edward Lazear served as a Research Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, Center for Corporate Performance at the Copenhagen Business School in Copenhagen, Denmark, and the IZA Institute for the Study of Labor in Bonn, Germany.

Edward Lazear was the Astra-Erikkson Lecturer and the 1993 Wicksell Lecturer in Stockholm, Sweden.

Edward Lazear had been a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research since 1974.

Edward Lazear had been a visiting professor at the Center for the Study of New Institutional Economics at the University of the Saarland in Germany, the Institut d'Etudes Politiques in Paris, and at the Institutes for Advanced Study in Vienna and Jerusalem.

Edward Lazear had delivered lectures across Australia, England, India, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Spain.

Since leaving his post as Chairman of the Bush Council of Economic Advisors, Edward Lazear made regular appearances on CNBC and Fox Business News.

Edward Lazear was a frequent contributor to the Wall Street Journal op-ed pages.

Edward Lazear was considered one of the pioneers of labor economics, and personnel economics, branches of economics that studies market dynamics between wages and labor.

Edward Lazear's 1995 book, Personnel Economics, was a seminal work that in addition to introducing the topic, encouraged a wave of subsequent research into labor and management relations.

Edward Lazear argued that this increase in productivity and output was not driven by workers just working harder, but, it included substitution of the labor force, with the company attracting and holding on to more efficient workers.

Edward Lazear goes on to say that while this would mean that employees would hold on to their jobs, mandatory retirement would help solve this problem.

Edward Lazear built on the lifetime payout thinking, and working with Professor Sherwin Rosen from the University of Chicago, introduced Tournament theory as a way to allocate wages and compensation where wage differences are based not on marginal productivity but instead upon relative differences between the individuals.

Edward Lazear was a proponent of market dynamics and efficiency and argued in favor of market driven actions rather than wage guarantees like minimum wages and other governmental interventions.

Edward Lazear further went on to make the case that free markets contribute to increased well-being of the poor.

Edward Lazear's team developed the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 which provided the first rounds of economic stimuli intended to boost the United States economy in the face of unprecedented shocks to the financial and housing sectors.

Edward Lazear had worked with nine other members on reforms to the Internal Revenue Code to provide policy options without impacting the revenue collections.

Edward Lazear stated that an optimal classroom size is larger for well behaved students, with the argument that classrooms had a public good element to them and when one student disrupts the class, learning is reduced for all students.

Edward Lazear studied high-stakes testing, and educator fears that high-stakes testing will incentivize students to focus on learning to the tests at the cost of not learning aspects that are less likely to be included in the tests.

Edward Lazear further goes on to make a case that tests should be well defined for younger students and more amorphous for advanced students.

Edward Lazear attempted to study the rise of multiculturalism and linked it to the importance of the linkages between culture and language to the overall population.

Edward Lazear goes on to say that in a pluralistic society, governmental actions that encourage diverse cultural-immigration over concentrated immigration can increase societal welfare.

Professor Edward Lazear had received honorary degrees from Albertson College of Idaho, Aarhus School of Business, the University of Zurich, and Copenhagen Business School.

Edward Lazear was an elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Econometric Society, and the Society of Labor Economists.

Edward Lazear had been the recipient of numerous National Science Foundation grants.

Edward Lazear was married to his wife Victoria, a litigation consultant, and had a daughter.

Edward Lazear was known to enjoy outdoor activities, and was an avid traveler, skier and mountain biker.