Research and publications

This website pulls together my work on a range of issues in economics and environment. It emphasizes publications since the mid-1990s; most of my earlier writing is not available in electronic form. (For older work contact me, or the publisher.) Click on a topic in the text below for a list of my publications in that area. Most of my publications since 2007, and some before that, have been about the economics of climate change and energy, often in collaboration with Elizabeth Stanton and Ramòn Bueno. See also the website of the Stockholm Environment Institute’s U.S. Center, where I have worked since 2007. Most of my work from 2000 to 2006, as well as some important studies since then, focused on cost-benefit analysis and regulations, often involving toxic hazards and chemicals policy. Lisa Heinzerling and Rachel Massey were frequent coauthors on work in this area. In the same years I also examined the economic and environmental impacts of global trade liberalization, often with Kevin Gallagher and other coauthors. Writing on economic theory and methods was a major focus in the late 1990s, often in collaboration with Neva Goodwin and others at Tufts University’s Global Development and Environment Institute (where I worked from 1995 to 2007). This area also includes a variety of publications before and after those years. Earlier in the 1990s, my work centered on the economics of waste and recycling. Selected publications are listed here; many of my studies in this area, done at the Tellus Institute (where I worked from 1985 to 1995), are available only in hard copy. A final area of interest, dating back to my days at Dollars & Sense magazine (1974-82), involves macroeconomics and crisis. This is a short list of publications for now, but soon, I hope, to become longer.

New media

My blog posts have appeared at times on Triple Crisis, Real Climate Economics, CPRblog, and occasionally on Grist. I don’t do Twitter or Facebook.

Memberships

I was a co-founder, and am a member of the steering committee, of Economists for Equity and Environment (E3 Network). I was the principal author of the E3 Network’s statement of purpose, “Real People, Real Environments, Realistic Economics”. I am a member scholar of the Center for Progressive Reform, an organization offering progressive scholarship and writing on environmental law and regulation. I am a (very amateur) trumpet player in the Second Line Social Aid & Pleasure Society Brass Band (SLSAPS), playing New Orleans-style and other music at community events and good causes in the Boston area. Education BA in mathematics and economics, Swarthmore College. PhD in economics, Harvard University. Contact Frank “dot” Ackerman “at” sei-us “dot” org