Hi everyone,
I saw the recent post requesting guest bloggers and asked John if they'd be interested. They must be desperate, because he said yes. About me: I received my Ph.D. from Penn State's Agricultural Economics department, but I escaped taking the absolute minimum number of classes I could get away with concerning agriculture and concentrated on environmental economics. I am have been at the U.S. EPA for my entire career and am currently at the National Center for Environmental Economics (NCEE). My primary area of expertise is on water pollution and policy: costs, benefits, and policy design. For example, NCEE is working on a large project looking at the Chesapeake Bay TMDL. We are primarily focused on estimating the benefits of the TMDL but our work touches on the other aspects as well. My second focus of work is on enforcement issues (again primarily regarding water pollution) and I have a pool of projects supporting the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance. I also work on one project evaluating a voluntary program and another one attempting to estimate the actual costs of an industrial water pollution regulation (to compare with the costs estimated during the rulemaking). Finally, I do most of the things--other than teaching--that are expected of Ph.D. economists: presenting, writing, reviewing and referring.
I hope to bring the perspective of a goverment economist to my guest posts, if not in-depth discussions of government policies. I also like beer and many of the same bands as John, so I am hoping that I fit in. I am required by our ethics rules to blog as a citizen and not a government employee, and I also get to include a disclaimer with each post. Please let me know if there's anything in particular you'd like to hear about!
Will
This work is not a product of the United States Government or the United States Environmental Protection Agency, and the author is not doing this work in any governmental capacity. The views expressed are those of the author only and do not necessarily represent those of the United States or the US EPA.
