David Dorn is the UBS Foundation Professor of Globalization and Labor Markets at the University of Zurich and the director of the university-wide interdisciplinary research priority program “Equality of Opportunity.” He was previously a tenured associate professor at CEMFI in Madrid, a visiting professor at the University of California in Berkeley, and a visiting professor at Harvard University.Professor Dorn’s research spans the fields of labor economics, international trade, economic geography, macroeconomics, and political economy. He published influential studies on the impacts of globalization and technological innovation on labor markets and society. David Dorn is among the 100 most highly cited economists worldwide in the last decade. In 2023, he was awarded the Hermann Heinrich Gossen Prize for the most accomplished economist in German-speaking countries under the age of 45.

Catrin Hinkel serves as CEO Microsoft Switzerland. She assumed the role in May 2021. Having spent more than 25 years in the tech industry across a variety of organizations and diverse cultures, Hinkel champions technology development as a solution to many challenges in the world, innovation as well as sustainability. Prior to joining Microsoft, Hinkel held notable roles at Accenture, most recently as Senior Managing Director, Europe Cloud First Strategy & Consulting Lead. Hinkel is a member of the Executive Committee of Digital Switzerland, the ASUT Industry Association Board and the Supervisory Board of the CISPA Helmholtz Center for Information Security. Alongside these roles, she is also a spokesperson for the Board of “Generation CEO”, a non-profit association and established network for women leaders in German-speaking countries. Hinkel holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Reutlingen (European Business School Reutlingen and London). She is also recognized for her commitment to digital innovation, including being named one of Switzerland’s Digital Shapers 2022 by Swiss Bilanz magazine and as one of the Top 100 by Women in Business magazine.

Rafael Lalive holds a position as a professor in economics at University of Lausanne since September 2006. His main research interests are twofold. On one hand, he works on the economic effects of reforms to public policy. Specifically, his research has focused on the effectiveness of active labor market programs in helping job seekers find jobs, on the role of financial incentives in unemployment insurance, on the effects of parental leave policies on fertility and return to work of mother of newborn children, on policies for disabled individuals and on the effects of environmental policies. On the other hand, he is interested in social economics, i.e. the importance of social interactions for education decisions and the role of social learning. His research has been published by major journals in economics such as the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Review of Economic Studies, the Journal of the European Economic Association, the Review of Economics and Statistics and also general science journals such as Science or PLOSone. He is a fellow of the Institute for the Study of Labor in Bonn (IZA) and an affiliate of CEPR and IFAU. Rafael Lalive earned a PhD in labor economics from University of Zurich in 20021, and was an invited scholar at the Center for Labor Economics at UC Berkeley in 2014 and at Tinbergen Institute in Amsterdam in the academic year 2002 to 2003. He advised the Swiss government on Covid-19 in 2020 and 2021.

Sendhil Mullainathan is one of the economists who not only study AI, but both apply it in their own research and study how to advance the underlying technology. He holds the first joint appointment between the MIT Economics and Computer Science Departments where he is the Peter de Florez Professor. He has in the past worked on a variety of areas including behavioral economics, poverty, discrimination, and finance. Mullainathan recently co-authored Scarcity: Why Having too Little Means so Much and writes regularly for the New York Times. Mullainathan is a recipient of the MacArthur “Genius Grant.” He has been designated a “Young Global Leader” by the World Economic Forum, was labeled a “Top 100 Thinker” by Foreign Policy Magazine, and was named to the “Smart List: 50 people who will change the world” by Wired Magazine (UK).

Jan Egbert Sturm is Professor of Applied Macroeconomics, Director of the KOF Swiss Economic Institute at ETH Zurich, Editor of the European Journal of Political Economy, and a member of several advisory committees in Switzerland and abroad. His research relies heavily on empirical methods and statistics, focusing on monetary economics, macroeconomics, and political economy, with a particular interest in areas closely related to practical and topical issues.

Philipp Zhang is a graduate student in economics at the University of Zurich. He joined the department in September 2020. Philipp holds Master of Sciences in European Economic Studies and Survey Statistics from Otto-Friedrich University Bamberg.