Macroeconomics and the Financial System
N. Gregory Mankiw is a Professor of Economics at Harvard University.  He began his study of economics at Princetion Universtiy, where he received an A.B. in 1980.  After earning a Ph.D in economics from MIT, he began teaching at Harvard in 1985 and was promoted to full professor in 1987. Professor Mankiw is a regular participant in academic and policy debates.  His research ranges across macroeconomics and includes work on price adjustment, consumer behavior, financial markets, monetary and fiscal policy, and economic growth.  In addition to his duties at Harvard, he has been a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, a member of the Brookings Panel on Economic Activity, and an adviser to the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and the Congressional Budget Office.  From 2003 to 2005 he was chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers.Laurence Ball is Professor of Economics at Johns Hopkins University. He is a research associate for the National Bureau of Economic Research and has been a visiting scholar at the Central Bank of Norway and the Reserve Bank of Australia. His academic honors include the Houblon-Norman Fellowship (Bank of England), a Professional Fellowship in Monetary Economics (Victoria University of Wellington and Reserve Bank of New Zealand), the NBER Olin Fellowship, and the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship.