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, Emeritus at Princeton University.
Bruno Contini, Professor Emeritus of the University of Turin and Honorary Fellow of the Collegio Carlo Alberto, joins the podcast to discuss his childhood under fascism, his experience studying and teaching in the United States, and his expertise on Italian labor markets.
Myra Strober, Professor Emerita at the School of Education at Stanford University, joins the podcast to discuss her path as a trailblazing female labor economist and the first president of the International Association for Feminist Economics.
Ray Marshall, Professor of Economics emeritus and Rapoport Centennial chair in Economics and Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin, joins the podcast to discuss his childhood in a Mississippi orphanage, how the GI bill helped him become an economist, and his experience as Secretary of Labor in the Carter administration.
W. Craig Riddell, Professor Emeritus of Economics at the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Columbia, joins the podcast to discuss his early life in small town Ontario, his brief stint in the Canadian navy, and how he discovered a passion for labor economics.
Thomas Kochan, the George Maverick Bunker Professor Emeritus of Management at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, joins the podcast to discuss his life’s work studying unions, arbitrating labor disputes, and advocating for the restoration of a social contract that rewards the contributions of workers. Kochan and Ashenfelter also discuss the “deep economic dimensions and deep political dimensions” of the currently ongoing United Auto Workers strike.
