Senior Research Affiliates
Dr. Moiz Bhai
Senior Research Affiliate
Moiz Bhai is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock and Associate Professor of Health Policy (by courtesy). In addition to his affiliation with the KRRC, he holds an affiliate position with the Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Global Working Group for Health Inequality at the University of Chicago, as well as being an Early Career Fellow at the Initiative on Enabling Choice and Competition in the Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics at the University of Chicago
Dr. Bhai has worked on topics in health, labor, and the economics of education
with a
particular focus on the economics of smoking and scope of practice occupational
licensing reform. His research has been published in Economic Inquiry, Economic
Letters, Southern Economic Journal, and the IZA Journal of Labor Economics. Moiz
holds a bachelor's, master's degree, and a PhD all from the University of Illinois
at Chicago. Previously he was an Adam Smith and Visiting Dissertation Fellow
at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University.
Senior Research Affiliate
Maria Koumenta is an Assistant Professor of Labor Economics at Queen Mary, University
of London. She is an expert on occupational regulation, currently leading the research
on this topic in the EU and UK. Her work explores the characteristics and prevalence
of occupational regulation, analyses its impact on labour market outcomes such
as earnings, skills, employment, migration and service quality. She has led various
projects funded by the UK government and the European Commission and has provided
testimony and policy advice to various UK government departments (UK Treasury,
Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Policy, Department of Health), UK
Parliamentary Committees, and officials at the European Commission. She was awarded
her PhD from the London School of Economics, where she also worked as a researcher
at the Centre for Economic Performance.
Dr. James Bailey
Senior Research Affiliate
J ames Bailey is an Associate Professor of Economics at Providence College, a Visiting Scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, and a Senior Affiliated Scholar with the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. He received his PhD in Economics from Temple University in 2014 and his BS in Economics from the University of Tulsa in 2009. He has published 30 academic articles on health, labor, and regulatory economics, including 8 articles on Certificate of Need.
Research Affiliates
Dr. Bobby Chung
Research Affiliate
Bobby is an applied microeconomist with specialties in labor, education, and health. He received his Ph.D. in Economics at Clemson University. He is now an Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of South Florida. He is also a research affiliate at the HCEO Global Working Group and CSOR research center. Prior to joining USF, Bobby was a faculty at St Bonaventure University and a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign).
Dr. Sriparna Ghosh
Research Affiliate
Dr. Ghosh is an Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Cincinnati,
Blue Ash. As an applied microeconomists with a focus on public, health, and
entrepreneurship economics, her research focuses on understanding access and
barriers within labor markets and economic wellbeing. Dr. Ghosh's current research
projects investigate the effect of occupational licensing and certificate of
need policies in understanding the relationship between public policy and health
outcomes. Dr. Ghosh was recently awarded a new investigator research grant
from the American Association of University Women to support my research on
entrepreneurship in developing countries.
Dr. Brian Meehan
Research Affiliate
Dr. Brian Meehan is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Berry College. Brian
earned his PhD in economics from Florida State University. He earned his MA
in economics from Central Michigan University and his BS in economics from
Northern Michigan University. His research interests include law and economics,
occupational licensing, and public choice. He has published in academic journals
including: Public Choice, The International Review of Law and Economics, and
Applied Economics. Much of his work focuses on the impact of occupational licensing
on labor markets and crime. He has also published policy reports on occupational
licensing for the Archbridge Institute and an op-ed appearing in The Hill.
Dr. Shishir Shakya
Research Affiliate
Dr. Shakya is an Assistant Professor of Economics at the Shippensburg University
of Pennsylvania and a Research Fellow of the Knee Center for the Study of Occupational
Regulation at West Virginia University. Dr. Shakya an applied economist specializing
in healthcare provider labor, licensing, and regulation markets. Dr. Shakya
is passionate about finding solutions that improve healthcare access and quality
at reduced costs. Dr. Shakya uses various applied econometric, spatial, and
policy evaluation techniques and supplement my empirical knowledge with the
practice of technology-driven methods such as data-scrapping, big data, predictive,
and causal machine learning approaches.
Dr. Shakya has been published in numerous peer-reviewed academic journals,
including the World Development, Annals of Regional Science, Energy Economics,
Contemporary Economic Policy, Drug and Alcohol Dependence, Spatial Economic
Analysis, Applied Economics Letters, Journal of Labor Research, and others.
Dr. Shakya has taught Regional Economics, Economic Analysis of Big Data,
Principles of Economics, Macroeconomics, Managerial Economics, Business Data
Visualization, and Elementary Business & Economic Statistics.
Dr. Noah Trudeau
Research Affiliate
Dr. Noah Trudeau is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Troy University. His
research specializes in occupational regulation, with a specific focus on the
intersection of economic history and the study of barriers created through
regulatory action. He contributes to maintaining an index of occupational licensing
stringency in the United States. When not working on regulatory studies, Noah
studies and contributes to pedagogy for the economics classroom by designing
new methods for encouraging student engagement. Dr. Trudeau earned Ph.D. in
Economics from West Virginia University.
Dr. Tingting Zhang
Research Affiliate
Tingting Zhang is an Assistant Professor of Organizational Studies and Analytics
at the Girard School of Business, Merrimack College. She has joined The School
of Labor and Employment Relations at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
in August 2021. She earned a Doctorate in Industrial Relations and Human Resources
and a Masters in Economics from the University of Toronto in Canada. She also
holds a Bachelor in Economics from the University of British Columbia in Canada
and a Bachelor in Computer Science from Shandong University in China.
Her research focuses on various training and development mechanisms both within
and outside organizations, such as occupational regulation and the emergence
of nondegree credentials, shape individuals’ career outcomes, especially marginalized
groups such as women and immigrants. Tingtings’s research has appeared in such
journals as International Migration Review, British Journal of Industrial Relations,
International Journal of Training and Development, and Canadian Public Policy.
Dr. Wenchen Wang
Research Affiliate
Wenchen Wang is a labor economist with research focus on labor market institutions (occupational licensing), job quality, and public policy. She is now an Industry Assistant Professor at Illinois Tech’s Stuart School of Business. Before joining Stuart, she was a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the School of Labor Employment and Relation, University of Illinois (Urbana Champaign). Wenchen received her PhD in Public Policy from University of Minnesota Twin Cities. She also has diversified policy experience on labor-economics related topics at different levels of public and governmental sectors, including Department of Labor, Minnesota Department of Human Services, and the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
Non-WVU Student Affiliates
Tanner Corley
Student Affiliate
Tanner Corley is from Bismarck, Arkansas. He received his Bachelor of Science
from the University of Central Arkansas (UCA) where he double majored in History
and Political Science and minored in Economics. During his time at UCA, Tanner
worked for the Arkansas Center for Research in Economics (ACRE) for two years
as an History Research Fellow. During his time at ACRE, Tanner published an
article titled “Barber Licensing in Arkansas: Public Health or Private Gain?”
with his mentor Dr. Marcus Witcher. He also wrote an article with his two mentors
Dr. Marcus Witcher and Dr. Wendy Lucas titled “License to Exclude: Minority
Barbers in Arkansas.” That manuscript has been submitted to Essays in Economic
and Business History and is currently being reviewed for publication.
After finishing at UCA in 2021, Tanner entered the History Masters program at
the University of Alabama (UA). At UA, Tanner wrote a seminar paper that explores
licensing regulations that affected the barber and cosmetology industries throughout
the twentieth century. After he graduates in May of 2023, Tanner plans to continue
in the PhD program at UA. Broadly, his historical interests include early twentieth
century political economy, the history of occupational regulations, business
history, and economic history in the United States.