Summer 2026

Dear Friends of Villanova Department of Economics,

At the time I am writing this, we are enthralled by the 2026 World Cup. Economics departments are often quite international, and ours is no exception. Based on place of birth, we've rooted for at least ten different countries: Brazil, China, Costa Rica, Germany, India, Ireland, Poland, Türkiye, England, Venezuela and, of course, the US!

This past academic year, our department has again organized excellent events, including our annual Lucia Lecture, a talk by Charles Schwab CEO Rick Wurster ’95 VSB and a visit from Ryan Lynch, Managing Parter of MOIC and former CEO of Hanwah Shipping. We're proud to consistently provide such excellent opportunities for students to see economics in action.

Meanwhile, behind the scenes our department continues to evolve. We have the privilege of welcoming three new faculty members this fall:

• April Meehl, PhD, received her PhD in Economics and Finance from the University of Wisconsin, and her research is on the macroeconomic impact of banking and financial market regulation.
• Dario Cardamone, PhD, holds a PhD in Economics from Notre Dame, and his dissertation studies the impact of sovereign risk shocks on financial markets and the macroeconomy. Hiring Dario also means that Villanova Economics can add Italy to the countries we root for in future World Cups!
• Sookti Chaudhary, PhD, joins us from Ursinus College and holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Kentucky. Her research and teaching interests lie in the fields of environmental economics and international trade.

With gratitude, we bid farewell to Teri Rissell, who retires after 25 years at Villanova. Through the years, Teri has brought economics to life for thousands of our students, and we wish her the very best as she shifts her focus to her family and grandchildren.

Ending on a sad note, we mourn the passing of Professor Emeritus Charles “Chuck” Zech, PhD, on May 17, 2026. Chuck had a tremendous impact over his 44 years at Villanova University, serving as chair of our department. He also founded and directed the Center of Church Management.

I hope you enjoy reading more about our year. Please contact Mary Kelly, PhD, or me if you have questions, suggestions, or would like to engage further with Villanova Economics!

Sincerely,

Erasmus Kersting, PhD

The World Affairs Council of Philadelphia hosted Mark Zandi, Chief Economist of Moody's Analytics, at Villanova University for a discussion on the US and global economic outlook. Zandi shared insights on inflation, interest rates, labor markets, and the challenges shaping today's economy. Many thanks to Michelle Casario, PhD, faculty director of the Moran Center for Global Leadership, for her work on this event.

February

March

April

The department hosted its spring 2026 marquee event for 500 Intro to Macroeconomics students. Ryan Lynch, Managing Partner of Maritime Opportunity Investment Corp. (MOIC), was the keynote speaker. Drawing on his industry experience, Lynch shared valuable insights into the challenges and opportunities shaping the maritime sector, reminding students that economists can reach the very top in any industry. Describing the current state of the US shipping industry and supply chain questions due to conflict around the Strait of Hormuz, he emphasized the importance of domestic shipbuilding for national security and how closure of waterways can have serious consequences.

A special thank you to Christopher Cohen P’29, Co-CEO of Defense Industrial Base Capital Fund (DIBCF), for making the connection to Lynch and for opening the program.

May

The department inducted 39 students into Omicron Delta Epsilon (ODE), the International Economics Honor Society. 

Grace Aroneo

Anna Brown

Rachel Castela

Aidan Eastman

Ekua Essel

Margaret Fearon

Emily Francesa

Daniel Guarnieri

Julia Heurtley

Richard Hollington IV

Donovan Jacobs

Grace Jerred-Scott

Ethan Khan

Susan Kotwicki

Jacob Lee

Dylan Lourie

Sophia Lutzker

Emily Mainwald

Luke Martin

Joshua Mayer

Aidan McGovern

Simryn Musante

Adam Na

Aidan Neville

Christian Occhipinti

Kate Parzych

Elizabeth Pflaum

Sophia Polito

Lenna Rodrigues-Reilly

Nicole Santerian

Julia Sarda

Paulina Sierra

James Sivley

Nicholas Stinger

Sohil Surapaneni

Evan Twitchell

Dominick Valenti

Irene Varsamis

Clare Voight

Faculty Presentations

Siyu Wang, PhD

• "Seeing the Gap in Returns to Education" at the BEEMA 9th Conference at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, PA and at Baylor University in Waco, TX
• "Influence When You Can: A Field Experiment on Climate Beliefs" at the Economic Science Association North American Meeting in Tucson, AZ, and at the Southern Economic Association 2025 Annual Meeting in Tampa, FL
• On climate belief updating at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA
• "Climate Beliefs: Social Signaling and Accountability in the Field" at the University of Pittsburgh

Jeanna Kenney, PhD

• "Explaining Real Estate Agent Heterogeneity: Do Brokers and Firms Matter?" at the University of Illinois' Chicago Real Estate Symposium
• "What's the Deal with Brokers?: Evidence from Regulatory Change in the U.S. Real Estate Market" at the American Economic Association (AEA) Meeting in Philadelphia, PA
• "Explaining Real Estate Agent Heterogeneity: Do Brokers and Firms Matter?" in the Rochester Institute of Technology Department of Accounting & Finance Seminar Series
• "Who is Footing the Bill? The Role of Contributions and Collective Bargaining in U.S. Public Pension Funding" at the Society of Labor Economists (SOLE) Annual Meeting while partaking in the selective junior faculty mentorship program

Christopher Kilby, PhD

• "How Does Spatial Complexity Impact Development Effectiveness? Political Siting versus Political Implementation" at the University of Zurich, Switzerland
• "Understanding Vote Switching in the United Nations," coauthored with Kathleen Heraty '28 VSB, at the 18th Political Economy of International Organizations Conference at IE University in Segovia, Spain
• "Borrowing Power: Why China Still Wants World Bank Loans," coauthored with Erasmus Kersting, PhD (Villanova University) and James Raymond Vreeland, PhD (Princeton University), at the 3rd Annual Politics of Sovereign Finance Conference in Washington, D.C.
• "Shock to the System: Canada & the AIIB" at three conferences the Temple Workshop on International Institutions and Global Governance at Temple University; the 2nd Annual Workshop on Political Economy of Sovereign Debt at New York University; and the Political Economy of Aid and Development Society Conference at Georgetown University

Michelle Casario, PhD

• “The Effects of Education, Age, and Gender on Real Earnings” with Gerard Olson, PhD (Department of Finance) at the 25th Annual National Business and Economics Society Conference in Kona, HI
• “The Impact of Inflation and Productivity Gains on Labor Income” at the Society of Interdisciplinary Business Research (SIBR) Conference in Osaka, Japan and served as the Session Chair

Faculty Publications

Akarsu, Mahmut Zeki, Cassidy Hruz, and Zeynep Yom (2026). Adaptive Innovation: The Impact of Prior Recessions on Firms' R&D Behaviour. Applied Economics.

Beam E., A. Fitzpatrick A, and M. E. Reimão (2026). Measuring The Impacts of Exposure to Daycare Quality on Child Development and Nutrition Measures Through a Large-Scale Randomised Trial in Kenyan Informal Settlements: Protocol. BMJ Open, 16:e112224.

Bénétrix, A., and Curran, M. (2025). Uncertainty Shocks and the Cross-Border Funding of Banks: Unmasking Heterogeneity. Journal of Money, Credit and Banking.

Burke, S., Robak, P., & Stumph, C. F. (2025). In Pursuit of Increased Student Engagement: Gamification, Introductory Macroeconomics, and The Amazing Race. Journal of Economics Teaching. 

Carleton, C., and M. Kelly (2026). Happy at work: Possible at any age?. Business Economics.

Catanzaro, B.* and Jeffords, C. (2025). The Weight of Words: How Constitutional Environmental Human Rights Shape Emissions. Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences. 

Jiang, S., S. Wang, and Q. Wei (2026). Thinking against the wind: Narratives, information, and reasoning ability. European Economics Review, 184:105267

Kelly, M., C. Swann, and M. Weisz (2026). Constellation Brands: Searching for the “Right” Product Mix. Ivey Publishing. 

Kenney, Jeanna, and Tomer Mangoubi. (2025). "Bargaining on behalf of others: Incentives, Beliefs, and Gender Gaps." Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 238: 107221.

Kersting, E. (2025). After Multilateralism: The US and the World Bank. The Economists’ Voice.  

Meng, D., and Wang, S. (2025). Echo Chambers: Choosing Interlocutors and Messages. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 236:107121.  

Li, T., and S. Wang (2026). Private and Public Appeals in Promoting Impure Public Goods: Evidence from a Field Experiment with Farmers. Ecological Economics, 247:109016.

Qin, X., Wang, S., Wu, M. Z., and Feng, X. (2025). From Adam Smith to Artificial Intelligence: An Experimental Exploration of Emotion in Humanomics. Public Choice, 202(3):383-399. 

Reimão, M. E. (2025). Cash and Change: A Replication and Further Analysis of a Cash Transfer Experiment in Malawi. Journal of Applied Econometrics, 40(7):862-872.

Reimão, M. E., Sabbadini*, R. and Rego, E.*. (2025). Serial Position Bias Among Experts: Evidence from a Cooking Competition Show. Kyklos, 78(2):701-717.  

Wang, S., Xu, H., Shen, M., and Meng, D. (2025, May). Returns to Education: The Roles of Income, Gender, and Occupations. AEA Papers and Proceedings,115:664-668.  



Yang, Y., and S. Wang (2026). The Timing of Pricing: A Theory and Experiment on Freelance Co-Creation. Managerial and Decision Economics.

In Memoriam of Charles E. Zech

by Peter Zaleski, PhD

I met Chuck Zech in 1987. He was department chair at Villanova and I was wrapping up my PhD at Maryland. I had a strong desire to live in the Philadelphia region, and as Chuck described it, I begged him for a job. We bonded quickly as his leadership style was based on making people feel included. He organized student-faculty softball and football games, ODE dinners, and threw a great faculty party at the start of every year. He also provided guidance on pedagogy. After Chuck left the chair’s office, he quickly began a productive research agenda.

I like to think that the seeds for the Center for Church Management were sown in 1992, but Chuck was dreaming about it long before then. One Monday morning in ‘92, Chuck and I bumped into each other in a stairwell in Bartley and after the standard “How was your weekend?”, Chuck told me he had just returned from a conference at Yale for the Program on Non-Profit Organizations (PONPO). He said the big research question of the day was – why do Catholics give less than Protestants at the collection plate? Given my research background, I immediately replied that it sounds like a free rider problem. Catholic congregations tend to be larger, on average, than Protestant ones. Since contributions are voluntary, the individual contribution would fall with the size of the group.

That brief exchange led to our publication in 1992, “Determinants of Contributions to Religious Organizations: Free Riding and Other Factors.” The article received some publicity as we were featured in a Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper article shortly thereafter. Our basic premise was that, even though religious organizations are focused on the spiritual, they are created and managed by human beings. As such, they are subject to the same economic forces facing all human organizations. We collaborated on seven more publications – “Economic and Attitudinal Factors in Catholic and Protestant Religious Giving” (1994), “Determinants of Religious Giving in Urban Presbyterian Congregations” (1994), “The Optimal Size of a Religious Congregation: An Economic Theory of Clubs Analysis” (1995), “The Effect of Religious Market Competition on Church Giving” (1995), “The Effectiveness of Various Solicitation Methods in Raising Member Contributions: Evidence from the Presbyterian Church” (1995), “Group Size and the Free-Rider Hypothesis: A Re-examination of Old Evidence from Churches” (1996) and “Efficiency in Religious Organizations” (1997).

Getting our research recognized was a validation. We were both excited to see our work cited in a JEL survey article on the economics of religion. Once at a conference, a participant saw Chuck’s name tag and asked, “Are you the Zech of Zaleski and Zech?” That became our greeting every time we bumped into each other thereafter. But like all good partnerships, our research collaboration eventually came to end. I had research interests in other areas, and Chuck’s passion for church management continued to grow. And at Villanova, our roles were changing also. I became department chair, and in 2004, Chuck was the founding director of the Center for Church Management. This was the culmination of two decades of his focus on the problems facing churches. The center was the first of its kind in the nation and had been Chuck’s dream. He worked tirelessly to make the Center successful. And he continued to publish prolifically in the area of church management.

While our research collaboration ended, our friendship continued. Through the years, we played several rounds of golf together, shared some jokes along the way and discussed (amicably) current events. Back in the day, his daughter babysat for my kids, and Chuck loved to entertain my kids when I brought them to work. He won awards for both his teaching and his research, but his most prized distinctions were that he was a great friend at work and a great dad at home. He would be unhappy with this tribute only because I didn’t add enough humor. Chuck loved it when we roasted him at his retirement dinner. Villanova was blessed for Chuck Zech having worked here, and I was blessed for having known him.

Note: The above picture appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 21, 1993, p. MD-3 with an article "Protestants outdo Catholics at the collection plate, study shows - Two Villanova professors study the trend."