University Seminar in Economic History

University Economic History Seminar Schedule

Fall 2025

Oct 9	Rohan Shah, NYU	"Crisis Planning: Wassily Leontief, Leonard Woodcock, and the Initiative Committee for National Economic Planning in the 1970s."
Nov 6	Martin Saavedra, Rutgers University	"Legislating Longevity: State-Level Public Health Laws and the Mortality Transition"
Dec 3	Jay Pan, Columbia University	TBA
Spring 2026
Feb 5	Ajay Mehrotra, Northwestern University and American Bar Association	TBA
Mar 5		TBA
Apr 9		TBA
May 7		TBA

 

The seminars for the 2025-26 academic year will be held at the Columbia Faculty House and hybrid on Zoom from 7:30 to 9:00 EST. We meet for dinner in the Faculty House at 6:30 before the seminar. Please email our rapporteur, Minwoo Kong, mk5106@columbia.edu, to RSVP to attend the dinner or to register in advance and obtain the Zoom link and passcode. 

The concerns of this seminar are wide ranging in time, place, and method. Emphasis is on the logic of European and American economic growth from feudal times forward with regular, but less frequent, contributions on Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Topics range from microeconomic studies of firms undergoing rapid technical change and households changing their interaction between home and market to more macroeconomic topics concerned with national and regional economic growth performance, the economics of imperialism, and the political economy of the Great Depression. Given the breadth of the seminar’s membership and interests, comparative economic history is often a central element in seminar discussions. Pre-circulation of papers permits vigorous discussion.

University Seminars Page 

University Seminars in Economic History