2013 UC San Diego Economics Roundtable Lecture Series

Corporate Sponsor

Economics Roundtable Contact

Natalie Wolfe
UC San Diego
Department of Economics
Phone: 858-534-9710
Fax: 858-822-2657

Information & Forms

The UC San Diego Economics Roundtable is organized by the UC San Diego Department of Economics. The purpose of the Roundtable is to provide top business professionals and community leaders in the San Diego region with the opportunity to share the views and opinions of renowned experts in the fields of economics, finance, business and public policy. Members of the Roundtable will share insights with their counterparts in the business community and with members of the UC San Diego faculty.

Online Registration:

Please note that you will need your Social Security number or a Student ID Number (supplied to you by calling UC San Diego Student Services at 858-534-3400) when completing the online registration. Registration for each lecture is $50 or, if you register for the entire series you'll receive a 25% discount for a total cost of $150.00.

John Hofmeister
CEO and Founder
Citizens for Affordable Energy

Friday, February 15, 2013
7:30 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. (Continental Breakfast)
UC San Diego Faculty Club

"Private Energy Investment: The Stimulus of the Century"

John Hofmeister is a key member of the United States Energy Security Council, a bipartisan group that includes former Secretary of State George P. Shultz and two former secretaries of defense, William J. Perry and Harold Brown, as well as three former national security advisers, a former CIA director, two former senators, a Nobel laureate, a former Federal Reserve chairman and several Fortune-50 chief executives.

Upon retirement from Shell Oil Company in 2008, Hofmeister founded the 501(c)(3), not-for-profit nationwide membership association Citizens for Affordable Energy. He heads this Washington, D.C.-registered public policy education firm that promotes sound U.S.-energy security solutions for the nation, including a range of affordable energy supplies, efficiency improvements, essential infrastructure, sustainable environmental policies and public education on energy issues.

As president of Shell, Hofmeister launched an extensive outreach program, unprecedented in the energy industry, to discuss critical global energy challenges. The program included an 18-month, 50-city engagement program across the country during which Hofmeister led 250 other Shell leaders to meet with more than 15,000 business, community and civic leaders, policymakers and academics to discuss what must be done to ensure affordable, available energy for the future.

A business leader who has participated in the inner workings of multiple industries for more than 35 years, Hofmeister also has held executive leadership positions in General Electric, Nortel and AlliedSignal (now Honeywell International). He is the author of Why We Hate the Oil Companies: Straight Talk from an Energy Insider (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010).

Hofmeister serves as the chairman of the National Urban League and is a member of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technical Advisory Committee. He serves as nonexecutive director of the Hunting PLC, London, UK; Lufkin Industries Inc.; CAMAC Energy, Inc.; and the Sodexo North America Business Advisory Board. He is an adviser to Liberty Power of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the nation’s largest minority owned power company. Hofmeister also serves on the boards of the National Energy Security Council, Washington, D.C.; the Foreign Policy Association, New York; Strategic Partners, LLC; the Gas Technology Institute; and the Center for Houston’s Future. He is a fellow of the National Academy of Human Resources, and is a past chairman and serves as a director of the Greater Houston Partnership. Hofmeister is active in education, serving on the Energy Advisory Board at the University of Houston, and is also a director of the Texas Education Reform Committee.

Hofmeister earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in political science from Kansas State University. In May 2010 he was awarded an honorary doctorate of letters from the University of Houston.

Robert Koenigsberger
Founder, CIO, Managing Partner
Gramercy

Thursday, April 18, 2013
7:30 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. (Continental Breakfast)
UC San Diego Faculty Club

"Emerging Markets Perspective on the European Debt Crisis"

Robert S. Koenigsberger is founder, chief investment officer and the managing partner of Gramercy. He founded Gramercy in 1998 with a vision for the firm to become a global, institutional investment management firm focused on emerging markets. Koenigsberger has more than 25 years of investment experience dedicated to emerging markets with a specialization in fixed income securities. He serves as portfolio manager for Gramercy Argentina Opportunity Fund and co-portfolio manager for Gramercy Emerging Markets Fund, Gramercy Distressed Opportunity Fund and Gramercy Distressed Opportunity Fund II. In 2010, he led Gramercy’s efforts in conceiving, organizing and facilitating the successful restructuring of Argentina’s defaulted debt, the first private sector-led restructuring of a sovereign default. Koenigsberger is head of the Investment Committee and the Asset Allocation Committee.

Prior to founding Gramercy, Koenigsberger was a senior vice president at Lehman Brothers from 1995 to 1998, where he managed the bank’s sovereign debt restructuring group. Prior to that, he was a vice president at Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated for three years where he traded performing and distressed emerging markets debt securities in New York, London and Hong Kong. From 1987 to 1991, he held the position of vice president at CR-P Associates, a financial advisory firm with offices in Central and South America that led sovereign debt restructurings, debt buy-backs and debt-equity swap transactions in Latin America.

Koenigsberger received a Master of Business Administration in finance from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, a Master of Arts in international studies with a concentration in Latin America from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts in Latin American political science and history of Latin America with a minor in economics from UC San Diego, where he graduated with honors. He completed his undergraduate and graduate theses on the historical origins and implications of the Latin American debt crisis.

Thad Kousser
Associate Professor of Political Science
UC San Diego

Friday, August 9, 2013
7:30 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. (Continental Breakfast)
UC San Diego Faculty Club

"How Can California Spend $146 Billion and Still Be Broke?"

Thad Kousser is a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego who specializes in state politics. His research looks at how constitutional reforms reshape government, at the role of parties in state legislatures, the ability of governors to enact new policies, the impact of term limits, and the use and misuse of the initiative process. He has published over forty articles and book chapters, and authored or edited six books including The Power of American Governors (Cambridge University Press, 2012), Politics in the American States, 10th Edition (CQ Press, 2012), and The Logic of American Politics, 5th Edition (CQ Press 2011). He is a recipient of the UCSD Academic Senate's Distinguished Teaching Award, the Faculty Mentor of the Year Award, and has worked as a staff assistant in the California, New Mexico, and United States Senates. He holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, and an A.B. in government summa cum laude from Harvard University.

John Williams
President and CEO
Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco

Thursday, October 3, 2013
7:30 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. (Continental Breakfast)
UC San Diego Faculty Club

"Economic Outlook"

John C. Williams took office as president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco on March 1, 2011. In this role, he serves on the Federal Open Market Committee bringing the Twelfth Federal Reserve Districts’ perspective to monetary policy discussion in Washington.

Since 2009, Williams served as executive vice president and director of research for the San Francisco bank, which he joined in 2002. He began his career in 1994 as an economist at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, following the completion of his doctorate in economics at Stanford University.

Williams’ research focuses on topics including monetary policy under uncertainty, innovation, productivity and business cycles. He has collaborated with economists from throughout the country and across the globe to examine economic and policy issues from different perspectives and has published numerous articles in leading research journals.

Williams currently serves as the managing editor of the International Journal of Central Banking. Previously he served as associate editor of the American Economic Review and the Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control. He has been a research associate for the Centre for Applied Macroeconomic Analysis since 2008. Additionally, he served as senior economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisers and as a lecturer at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business.

Prior to completing his doctorate at Stanford, Williams earned a master of science with distinction in economics from the London School of Economics in 1989 and an bachelor of arts with high distinction from UC Berkeley in 1984.

Acknowledgements

The Department of Economics gratefully acknowledges the 2013 UC San Diego Economics Roundtable Steering Committee for their support:

Don Billings, Principal Promotory Financial Group	Alan. N. Nevin, Principal The London Group Realty Advisors
Nils Clark, Senior Financial Advisor, Vice President-Investments Wells Fargo Advisors	Marjorie Flavin Associate Professor of Economics UC San Diego
Valerie Ramey, Chair of Economics UC San Diego	John Reis Reis Investment Management
Jeff Lewin, Partner Sullivan Hill Lewin Rez & Engle	Bill Nelson, Board of Directors Regents Bank
Steve McCourt, Vice President of Programs CFA Socity San Diego	Jeff Witt, President CFA Socity San Diego

The UCSD Economics Roundtable thanks Corporate Sponsor CFA Society San Diego; campus partner UCSD Alumni; and Table Underwriters The London Group Realty Advisors, The San Diego Daily Transcript, Sullivan Hill Lewin Rez & Engel, Regents Bank, and Reis Investment Management for generously supporting this series.

UC San Diego