A podcast series hosted by Orley Ashenfelter

The Work Goes On

Microphone on right in a dark recording studio

An Oral History of Industrial Relations and Labor Economics

In this podcast series of conversations with leading thinkers and practitioners, we are creating an oral history of an entire generation of industrial relations experts and labor economists whose contributions to their fields have been absolutely extraordinary. Hosted by Orley Ashenfelter, the Joseph Douglas Green 1895 Professor of Economics at Princeton University.

Episode

March 20, 2023

Frank Stafford on the origins of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID)

Frank Stafford, Professor of Economics Emeritus at the University of Michigan, joins the podcast to talk to Princeton’s Orley Ashenfelter about the origins of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and his research on labor supply, income volatility, household finances, and more.

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Episode

March 03, 2023

Robert Solow on growing up in Brooklyn, fighting Nazis, and everything that came after

In a wide-ranging interview, Robert Solow joins the podcast to talk about the origins of his remarkable career, covering everything from his being “a child of the Great Depression” to leaving Harvard to fight in WWII to his time serving in President Kennedy’s Council of Economic Advisors.

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Episode

February 20, 2023

Richard Freeman on the state of unions in the U.S., why few Americans pursue STEM degrees, and more

Richard Freeman, who holds the Herbert Ascherman Chair in Economics at Harvard University, joins the podcast to talk to Princeton’s Orley Ashenfelter about the early influences of Martin Segal and John Dunlap on his career, who pursues careers in STEM and why, and whether we can expect inequality at the bottom of the wage distribution, which shrunk during the pandemic for the first time in recent history, to continue its decline.

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Episode

February 06, 2023

Robert McKersie on his lifelong study of labor negotiations and the state of unions today

Robert McKersie, Professor of Management Emeritus at MIT's Sloan School of Management, joins the podcast to talk to Princeton’s Orley Ashenfelter about his path from being the son of an International Workers of the World (IWW) member in Paterson, NJ to becoming one of the leading global experts on labor negotiations.

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Episode

January 23, 2023

Claudia Goldin on her journey from the Bronx to Harvard–with lots of groundbreaking research in between

Claudia Goldin, the Henry Lee Professor of Economics at Harvard University, joins the podcast to talk to Princeton’s Orley Ashenfelter about growing up as an “inner city kid” in the Bronx, how her famous study on the impact of blind auditions at orchestras came to be, and her life’s work on “the single most important change in the labor force” for almost every country: women’s labor force participation.

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