Lisa Cook

Lisa D. Cook is Professor of Economics and International Relations at Michigan State University. She was the first Marshall Scholar from Spelman College and received a second B.A. in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from Oxford University. She earned a Ph.D. in economics from the University of California, Berkeley with fields in macroeconomics and international economics. Prior to this appointment, she was on the faculty of Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, Deputy Director for Africa Research at the Center for International Development at Harvard University, and a National Fellow at Stanford University. Among her current research interests are economic growth and development, innovation, financial institutions and markets, and economic history. Dr. Cook is a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and is the author of a number of published articles, book chapters, and working papers. She is on the Board of Editors of the Journal of Economic Literature, and her research has appeared in such journals as the American Economic Review and the Journal of Economic Growth. This research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Bureau for Economic Research, the Smithsonian Institution, Harvard Business School, and the Economic History Association, among others. She is currently Director of the American Economic Association Summer Program and was President of the National Economic Association from 2015 to 2016. In 2019, she was awarded the Impactful Mentor Award (for mentoring graduate students) by the American Economic Association Mentoring Pipeline Program and was elected to the Executive Committee of the American Economic Association. During the 2011-2012 academic year, she was on leave at the White House Council of Economic Advisers under President Obama and has had visiting appointments at the National Bureau of Economic Research, the University of Michigan, and the Federal Reserve Banks of New York, Chicago, Minneapolis, and Philadelphia. She serves on the Advisory Boards of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago (Academic Advisory Council), the National Science Foundation (Social and Behavioral Sciences), the Opportunity and Inclusive Growth Institute of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, and the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation of the Smithsonian Institution. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Dr. Cook has been a Sigma Xi (Scientific Research Society) Distinguished Lecturer and was recently named an Edison Fellow at the US Patent and Trademark Office. She is a guest columnist for the New York Times (Economic View) and for the Detroit Free Press and a regular contributor on CNBC, MSNBC, and NPR. She speaks English, French, Russian, Spanish, and Wolof.

Dr. Cook is currently serving as the Deputy Team Lead for the Federal Reserve, Banking, and Securities Regulators Agency Review Team on the Biden-Harris Transition team

Professional affiliations

Michigan State University