Ann Helwege

Associate Professor of Economics
B.A., Ph.D., State University of New York, Buffalo

Office hours:
contact for hours

Office: TBA
Phone: 617-975-9361
Email: helwegan@emmanuel.edu 

My goal at Emmanuel is to make students think about how we make choices as a society, and perhaps in some small way, to help them alter the outcome of those decisions.

Consider the questions that economists ask: Why are some people unable to afford housing? Is it a good idea to give companies patents on lifesaving drugs? Are we protecting enough wildlife, and if not, could the private sector do so by itself or do we need government intervention? What education policies would enable the poorest Americans to move up the economic ladder? The tools of economics can provide powerful insight into their answers.

In working with students, I try to sustain a passion for social responsibility and to build competence in the use of analytical tools. We look at concepts in the context of meaningful questions, for example, by applying the concept of elasticity to the debate about the minimum wage. We use math and the tortured language of economics, but we also engage in a conversation about how society works. I believe that students who can explain the logic behind economic arguments can become persuasive advocates for good policy.

My research has focused on the relationship between macroeconomic policy and poverty in Latin America. In addition to articles in scholarly journals, I co-authored Latin America's Economy and co-edited Latin America's Economic Future and Modernization and Stagnation: Latin American Agriculture. This research has been presented at the World Bank, the Federal Reserve and the International Labor Organization.

I am also deeply interested in environmental policy in the US and regularly teach courses in this field. The economic challenge is to define incentives for environmental conservation without fostering a culture in which cash is accepted as a substitute for responsible behavior. Students often combine their interest in pollution control and wildlife protection with an interest in sustainable development in poor countries. For a variety of practical reasons, I also teach classes about financial markets.

The rewards of teaching for two decades lie in the stories that come back from former students. They are saving forests in Mexico, building low-income housing in Venezuela, stopping cyanide leaks from goldmines in Ghana, and advocating for environmental provisions in free trade agreements. They say they are more effective for having learned economics, for its analytical tools explain much of what we struggle with as a society.