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Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

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CESO Leadership

Tara Watson headshot
Tara Watson Director - Center for Economic Security and Opportunity, John C. and Nancy D. Whitehead Chair, Senior Fellow - Economic Studies
Sarah Reber Headshot
Sarah Reber Cabot Family Chair - Economic Studies, Senior Fellow - Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

Our experts

Randall Akee
Randall Akee Nonresident Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity
Gary Burtless Senior Fellow Emeritus - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

Kristin Butcher
Kristin F. Butcher Nonresident Senior Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity
marcus casey
Marcus Casey Nonresident Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

Tiffany Ford
Tiffany N. Ford Nonresident Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

Amy Goldstein
Amy Goldstein Visiting Fellow - Economic Studies
haskins
Ron Haskins Senior Fellow Emeritus - Economic Studies

Harry Holzer
Harry J. Holzer Nonresident Senior Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

Melissa Kearney is the Neil Moskowitz Professor of Economics at University of Maryland, researching domestic social policy, poverty, and inequality. Director of the Aspen Economic Strategy Group, she’s a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and nonresident Senior Fellow at Brookings Institution. Previously, Kearney directed the Hamilton Project at Brookings and co-chaired J-PAL’s State and Local Innovation Initiative. She is a senior editor of the Princeton/Brookings journal The Future of Children, editorial board member of American Economic Journal: Economic Policy and Journal of Economic Literature, and advisory board member for the Notre Dame Wilson-Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities, Smith Richardson Foundation, and Russell Sage Foundation.Melissa S. Kearney is the Neil Moskowitz Professor of Economics at the University of Maryland. She is also Director of the Aspen Economic Strategy Group; a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER); a non-resident Senior Fellow at Brookings; a scholar affiliate and member of the board of the Notre Dame Wilson-Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO); and a scholar affiliate of the MIT Abdul Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL). She is a senior editor of the Future of Children, an editorial board member of the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy and Journal of Economic Literature, and a former co-editor of the Journal of Human Resources. She serves on the Board of Governors of the Smith Richardson Foundation. Kearney served as Director of the Hamilton Project at Brookings from 2013-2015 and as co-chair of the JPAL State and Local Innovation Initiative from 2015-2018.Kearney's academic research focuses on domestic policy issues, especially issues related to social policy, poverty, and inequality. Her work has been published in leading academic journals and has been frequently cited in the popular press. She has testified before Congress on the topic of U.S. income inequality. Kearney teaches Public Economics at both the undergraduate and PhD level at the University of Maryland. She holds a BA in Economics from Princeton University and a PhD in Economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she studied on a National Science Foundation graduate student fellowship and a Harry S Truman fellowship.
Melissa S. Kearney Nonresident Senior Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity, The Hamilton Project

Phil Levine
Phillip Levine Nonresident Senior Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity
Sarah Reber Headshot
Sarah Reber Cabot Family Chair - Economic Studies, Senior Fellow - Center for Economic Security and Opportunity
Isabel V. Sawhill Senior Fellow Emeritus - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

Mallika Thomas
Mallika Thomas Nonresident Fellow - Economic Studies, Center for Economic Security and Opportunity

Tara Watson headshot
Tara Watson Director - Center for Economic Security and Opportunity, John C. and Nancy D. Whitehead Chair, Senior Fellow - Economic Studies

STAFF

Bee Barnett, Center Manager

Janina Broker, Research Analyst

Gabriela Goodman, Senior Research Assistant

Gabriela graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a BS in Economics. While at UNC, she wrote a thesis exploring the effects of mental health on academic achievement and the long-term consequences of pass/fail grading flexibility. She previously interned at the U.S. House of Representatives and worked as a research assistant at UNC. Her research interests include social and economic mobility, education policy, and mental health.

Zaria Roller, Senior Research Assistant

Zaria graduated from Williams College with a BA in Economics and a concentration in Africana Studies. At Williams, she wrote a thesis investigating the impact of statewide universal pre-k programs on maternal labor supply. After graduating, she worked as a predoctoral research assistant at the Princeton University Program in Public Finance and served as a research assistant on the White House Council of Economic Advisers. Her research interests include early childhood education, labor, and health.  

Jonathon Zars, Research Assistant 

Jonathon graduated from the University of Missouri with a BS in Economics and Statistics. At MU, he completed a senior thesis examining the economic returns of various forms of social capital, along with a capstone project investigating farmers’ market relationship to community participation in SNAP and other food assistance programs. He previously served as a research assistant at MU’s Institute of Public Policy, where he focused on the needs of Missouri’s kinship caregiver population and the impact of community-based re-entry programs on individuals involved in the state’s probation and parole system. His interests lie at the intersection of economic mobility, safety net frameworks, and child welfare initiatives.