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The Initiative represents a partnership of the Department of Economics and the George W. Bush Institute, focusing on advancing economic policies that promote economic growth and strengthen our competitiveness in the global economy. The Initiative got off to a strong start during its inaugural academic year. It hosted three prominent Visiting Fellows: Mary Lovely of Syracuse and the Peterson Institute for International Economics, an authority on U.S.-Chinese economic relations; Kyle Bagwell of Stanford, an expert on game theory and multilateral trade agreements and an 51³Ô¹ÏÍøgraduate; and David Weil of Brown, a leading figure in labor economics and economic growth. The Initiative also hosted former World Bank President and Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick and former Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin.

51³Ô¹ÏÍøeconomists James Lake and Klaus Desmet published policy-focused pieces through the Initiative, and numerous members of the Department as well as 51³Ô¹ÏÍøundergraduates participated in Initiative programs in the course of the year. Several faculty members provided valuable advice on policy-oriented projects in the Initiative. Four 51³Ô¹ÏÍøeconomics students worked for the Initiative as research assistants in the course of the year, with senior Sarah Beth Luckey co-authoring an essay with Cullum Clark, a Director in the Initiative and an 51³Ô¹ÏÍøAdjunct Professor, and Initiative Associate Kristin Spanos in the Bush Institute’s quarterly policy journal The Catalyst. At the beginning of the 2019-20 academic year, the Department welcomed Abdullah Shamim, the first George W. Bush Institute-51³Ô¹ÏÍøDoctoral Fellow, to its Ph.D. program.