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Both Yeshiva College and Stern College for Women have new chairs for their Economics Departments, and conveniently enough, both chairs are occupied by the same man: James Kahn.  A new appointment for the Fall 2009 semester as the Henry and Bertha Kressel Professor and Department Chair of Economics, Dr. Kahn held a Visiting Professor of Finance position at University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School and a Visiting Scholar position at New York University’s Stern School of Business before coming to Yeshiva.  At Yeshiva, he spends much of his time heading both undergraduate Economics Departments, and travels back and forth between his offices at the Wilf and Beren Campuses.

Dr. Kahn began his economics education at Harvard University after his primary education (“in more ways than one, “ he notes) in the Detroit  public schools. He then moved on to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he received his Ph.D.  His dissertation, titled “Inventories and the Volatility of Production,” focused on  topics that Dr. Kahn maintains a strong interest in and continues to research.  These areas of study are within macroeconomics and long-term growth, both specialties of Dr. Kahn.

“Long-term growth and productivity,” Dr. Kahn says, “are especially relevant today because of the connection to housing prices,” an issue frequently in current headlines.  Dr. Kahn has himself looked deeper into the trends and meanings of present economic volatility, and he stresses the usefulness of studying economics for students who want to understand their world better.  And Dr. Kahn knows multiple sides of economics: in addition to occupying a number of academic positions, he worked for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York for eleven years, moving from Senior Economist all the way up to Vice President.

Charged with invigorating the Economics Department at Yeshiva, Dr. Kahn points to increased student interest as an important factor in moving forward: “The very good, very smart students here should consider it,” he said. "It’s more and more an important subject to understand and have a mastery of, and it’s a good background for a lot of different [career] paths.”  Hiring more faculty and enabling faculty to teach toward their specialties and research, he says, are top priorities. 

The most inspiring and encouraging factor that led Dr. Kahn to YU was the extent to which the administrators and donors “were behind the building up of the department.”  Dr. Kahn also noted a tremendous “compatibility of visions” between what he saw as the Economics Department’s goals and visions and what the administration wanted.

Though he has spent only one semester in Yeshiva University and has not yet taught a course in Yeshiva College (this semester, he taught “Money and Banking” at Stern), Dr. Kahn has noticed the intelligence and passion of students through his role as academic advisor for Economics majors.  He plans to teach Intermediate Macroeconomics in the Spring semester, and is excited to get to the classroom and possibly drum up some interest in a future Advanced Macroeconomics course on growth.  Dr. Kahn encourages all students, not just Economics majors, to keep an eye on how the department is changing and to consider the role of economics in their future.