Experimental economist Joy Buchanan is the featured guest for the Indiana University East School of Business and Economics Spring Speaker Series.

Buchanan will present two different lectures scheduled for Monday, April 3, and Tuesday, April 4. Both talks are free and open to the public.

Buchanan will give her first campus lecture at 2 p.m. on April 3 on the topic, “If Wages Fell During a Recession,” in Whitewater Hall, Room 132.

“The U.S. economy was briefly in a recession last year and is teetering on entering a recession again,” said event organizer Feler Bose, associate professor of Economics at IU East.

Bose explained that while there are options available to avoid massive layoffs, some options, such as lowering all wages, negatively affect morale and productivity. Conversely, small wage increases during high inflation are not as detrimental to morale, despite real wages still decreasing. “Dr. Buchanan shows all this using experiments, which is her unique contribution,” Bose added.

Buchanan will deliver her keynote address, “Willingness to be Paid: Who Trains for Tech Jobs?” at 12:30 p.m. the following day in the Vivian Auditorium, located in Whitewater Hall.

Tech jobs pay well, and employees don’t have to deal with excessive travel or the demand of physical labor. And yet, tech jobs are still experiencing labor shortages.

“While the pay is good, there are tradeoffs due to high pressure to maintain being current, resulting in depression, anxiety, and so on,” Bose said.

Buchanan will examine the supply of domestic talent for the U.S. workforce, explore policy solutions for training more people for tech and show the results of a new experiment centered on asking people to code.

Buchanan is an assistant professor of quantitative analysis and economics at Samford University. She received her Ph.D. from George Mason University, and she has published articles in peer-reviewed journals including Labour Economics and Experimental Economics. Her research is in behavioral economics—with a current focus on applying experimental methods to current issues in the labor market.

The Spring Speaker Series is sponsored by the Charles Koch Foundation. The series is co-sponsored by Delta Mu Delta, the IU East Center for Economic Education, and the IU East Business and Economic Research Center.

For a look at past installments of this series, visit iue.edu/business/index.html.