Student Essay Contest Results
2023 Essay Contest Results
Graduate category
Winner: Ekaterina Alekhanova (Carleton University)
Summertime Sadness: Time Sensitivity of Electricity Savings from a Behavioral Nudge
Alekhanova replicates a large randomized control trial of a behavioral intervention regarding information on home energy use in Medicine Hat, Alberta. She finds that while intervention induced energy savings on aggregate, because of the hourly savings profile of households, the benefits of the intervention were drastically reduced. Households in Medicine Hat decreased their energy usage due to the program overall, but when accounting for the hourly distribution of the program’s impact, the intervention fails to target the times that could potentially deliver the most socially efficient electricity conservation.
Honourable mention: Noah Fry (McMaster University)
Bye Buy Canada? Social Procurement Under an Inclusive Canadian Trade Policy
Fry’s essay examines the tensions inherent in stronger binding rules for government procurement on the one hand, and the neoliberal-inflected international trading agreements. Using text-reuse measures of international agreements, they argue that Canada’s efforts to rescue the rules-based international economic order through comprehensive agreements may have had an unintended effect of undermining efforts to re-engage the state as an economic and social driver through procurement.
Honourable mention: Narcisse Sandwidi (Université de Montréal)
Automation and Cross-Occupation Spillovers
Sandwidi’s essay was an investigation of the how automation in routine occupations absorbs capital from non-routine occupation, reducing employment and wages in the latter. Sandwidi finds significant loss of labour income resulting from these spillover effects, and estimates a significant contribution to the rise of inequality in the United States from 1980 to 2010.
Undergraduate category
Winner: Arielle Désirée Koffi (University of Ottawa)
Tony Lawson et ses vues sur la formalisation et les mathe?matiques en e?conomie
Koffi’s essay was a comprehensive and engaging survey of the social critiques of Tony Lawson in the field of economics and philosophy. Koffi’s synthesis included the critiques regarding the trends in the economics discipline related to formalization and a creative summation of the concepts of social ontology that are fundamental to this particular strand of economic critique.
Many thanks to this year’s panel of judges, PEF Steering Committee members Mathieu Dufour, Joëlle Leclaire, Rob Gillezeau, Kevin Young and Vicki Zhang.
PAST WINNERS
2018 Essay Contest Results
Graduate category
Winner: Chukwudi Ezeani (MA Student in Environmental, Resource and Development Economics at the University of Winnipeg)
The Effect of Deregulation on Price per Kilowatt Hour (kwh) of Electricity in the United States
Ezeani engages with the classic economic theories of regulation through an analysis of electricity deregulation and its effects on prices per kilowatt hour of electricity in the USA, between 1990 and 2010. Using panel data, Ezeani deploys a difference-in-difference approach to investigate the effects of electricity deregulation on electricity prices. Their results reveal that electricity deregulation actually increased prices, rather than lowered them as much conventional theory would predict.
Honourable mention: Rebecca Mukuna (MPP Student in Public Policy, Administration and Law at York University)
Health and Safety for Migrant Farm Workers in the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program
This very well written paper convincingly argues that Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act, which was extended to farm workers in 2006, is unlikely to provide an effective safeguard for workers in the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP). The very nature of the SAWP and the conditions in which SAWP workers are employed are not compatible with workers taking advantage of the rights to participate, know, and refuse laid out in the Occupational Health and Safety Act. As the paper nicely concludes, it fails to “respond to their day-to-day realities as vulnerable temporary workers.”
Undergraduate category
Winner: David Barmes (BA Student in Economics at McGill University)
The Role of Money in the Ecological Transition
This paper, which is well-reseacrhed, neatly written and convincing, is an excellent contribution to the discussion on the ecological transition. The essay is especially well-structured: it identifies a set of phenomena, raises perplexities about said phenomena, provides a fulsome exploration of the widest possible set of solutions and then identifies and argues for one particular answer. The author studies three sets of proposals, namely full-reserve banking, controlling money, and local currencies, analyzing from the standpoint of various schools of thought in economics as well as references and citations from across the social sciences, which allows him to go beyond purely economic considerations about money. Overall, the paper did not have any identifiable shortcoming and was clearly the strongest submission in the undergraduate category.
Honourable Mention: Richelle Green (BA student in Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University)
This timely, very well-written and documented essay makes an important contribution to the pharma care debate in Canada. The author provides a cogent analysis of the ways in which contemporary free trade agreements, often alleged to be progressive, constrain the elaboration and implementation of progressive public policies in the healthcare sector in relation to pharma care. The issues at hand are laid out clearly and the author makes a solid demonstration of the impacts of free trade agreements on pharmaceutical products and the way in which it negatively affects the access to health care in Canada. While the analysis of the neoliberal framework could have been more developped, this paper was very strong and fully deserving of an honourable mention.
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Many thanks to this year’s panel of judges, PEF members Jordan Brennan, Ian Hudson, Audrey Laurin-Lamothe, Joëlle Leclaire, and Kevin Young.
2017 Essay Contest Results
There are two co-winners in the graduate category this year :
Audrey Laurin-Lamothe, Université du Québec à Montréal, for a paper entitled “L’application des principes de gouvernance à la Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec et les politiques de rémunération de son conseil d’administration et de sa haute direction de 2000 à 2014”
We organize ourselves according to rules – some codified, others implicit – that determine who gets what how and when. These rules give shape to society’s distribution of power and wealth. The term commonly used to describe sets of rules is governance. It is the “place” where power and wealth are contested and settled. We understand that implicitly in the family unit, where parents determine these matters. In government, the democratic process shapes the drama as does entrenched bureaucratic and corporate interests. In the corporate world, the process plays out between management and labour but, also, crucially, between what the governance literature refers to as the principals – the owners – and the agents – or management.
In her superbly researched and tightly argued piece, Audrey Laurin-Lamoth documents, details and critically dissects the evolution of the governance drama in one of Quebec Inc.’s most celebrated corporate entities, the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec. She shows how the philosophy of “new public management” – an instantiation of neoliberalism cum financialization – gradually shifted the governance terrain of the Caisse such that representation from labour, government and the co-operative sector – all constituent elements of the board when the Caisse was founded in the 1965 as part of – was gradually supplanted by representatives from Québec’s corporate elite. Along with this shift, the author documents the growing remuneration paid to the Caisse’ board and its executive team.
The PEF review committee was impressed by Ms. Laurin-Lamothe’s attention to detail, paintaken primary research, and superb structure and writing. The world needs more of this kind of work. This paper richly deserves first prize.
(Note: Ce texte a été publié Dans Hanin, Frédéric (dir.). La Caisse de dépôt et placement du
Québec à l’épreuve de la financiarisation. Québec : Presses de l’Université Laval,
Collection Vie économique, p. 75-115.)
And
Matthew Polacko, King’s College London for a paper entitled “Income Inequality and Voter Turnout in Canada, 1988-2011”
This paper contributes to the political understanding of economic inequality in Canada by examining the determinants of voter turnout in Canada. The analysis, which makes use of Canadian Election Survey data, finds a powerful relationship between both low incomes and income inequality and low voter turnout. Interestingly Polacko finds that inequality reduces turnout overall, for all income levels – supporting a position known as relative power theory, which suggests while wealthy individuals also reduce their turnout numbers they are affected to a lesser extent than the poor because they only need to participate minimally in order to maintain their dominant position in the political process.
The judges also gave an honourable mention to Ryan Peacock, of the University of Ottawa, for a paper entitled “Loosening the Belt: A Critical Assessment of the US Federal Reserve’s Large-Scale Asset Purchases”
This paper examines the effect of unconventional monetary policy by the US Federal Reserve following the 2008 financial crisis. Specifically, Peacock analyses a variety of data that assess the consequences of the Fed’s large-scale asset purchase (LSAP) actions on credit conditions, unemployment, inflation and long-term interest rates. Peacock finds that the effects of the Fed’s actions were fairly narrow in their scope and consequence, and while there were some notable exceptions such as the effect on yields on long-term securities, these unconventional monetary policy actions neither led to the kind of disastrous consequences by right-wing commentators at the time nor did they achieve the stated objectives set out by the Fed.
In the undergraduate category, the winner, from the University of Manitoba, was Eduardo Regier for his paper, “Determinants of Labour Union Membership in Canada.” In this clear and concise paper, Eduardo uses a probit regression to test whether factors, such as education level and industry, increase the likelihood that a worker will be in a union. In an important finding for Manitoba, which is in the process of changing its union certification rules from automatic card check to a mandatory secret ballot, Eduardo finds that there is a lower probability of union membership in provinces in which card check is not allowed. He also finds that belonging to a union significantly increases a worker’s after tax income.
The judges also decided to award two honourable mentions in the undergraduate category, to Stéphanie Renaud, of the University of Ottawa and Michelle Ampadu of Western University.
Stéphanie Renaud’s paper, “Financialization of the Non-Financial Corporate Sector in Canada: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis” uses Post-Keynesian theory to explain the trend to financialization in Canada. In an extremely well written paper, Stéphanie provides graphical evidence to show that non-financial firms are holding an increasing share of financial assets. She also demonstrates a number of other results that are consistent with Post-Keynesian theory. For example, financialization has been accompanied by a lower ratio of retained earnings and an increase in net profits relative to labour costs.
The second mention goes to Michelle Ampadu for “Do capital outflow controls affect wealth inequality?”
In 2014, a 700-page book of dense text and equations by an obscure French economist named Thomas Piketty improbably topped the New York Times hardcover non-fiction bestseller list. With hindsight, the success of Capital in the 21st Century should not be entirely surprising, emerging as it did so shortly after the financial crisis cleanly exposed the increasingly unequal distribution of power and wealth. In some ways, the book’s success speaks to Karl Marx’s dictum that “Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please,” or put differently, timing is everything.
Piketty’s book spawned a mini-industry of critiques and academic research, and Michelle Ampadu’s hugely ambitious undergraduate paper is proof of its continued relevance. Ampadu outlines the essence of Piketty’s thesis that where the return on wealth (=r) exceeds the growth rate (=g), wealth inequality worsens. Building on empirical work by Acemoglu and Robinson who argue that institutions – not general economic laws like those posited by Piketty – ultimately drive inequality, Ampadu tests Piketty’s hypothesis by positing that the returns to capital (and hence the r-g relationship) will be affected by the degree to which an economy is closed or open to the world. Her research finds that in countries with capital controls, Piketty’s famous r-g>0 relationship holds; in more open societies, the relationship breaks down. The PEF review committee felt that while the paper could benefit from a careful review, it was nevertheless an impressive effort, one that humbled the reviewers when they reflected on their own undergraduate work. This essay is richly deserving of an honourable mention.
Many thanks to this year’s panel of judges, Ian Hudson, Kevin Young, and Marc-André Pigeon.
2016 Essay Contest Results
The winner of the graduate category was entitled “Debating Unconditional Basic Income”, by Matt Wilder a PhD Candidate at the University of Toronto. This essay engages in an analysis of what the behavioural response of a basic income policy might be, and pays attention to both the normative and empirical questions within this issue. Specifically it interrogates the necessity of instituting a regime in which recipients of basic income contribute to the productive capacity of the society. Using survey data Wilder shows that imposing strong norms may largely be ineffective since individuals with income security appear to behave altruistically absent considerations of social pressure or duty.
In the graduate category, we also selected two papers as deserving of honourable mention.
The first, entitled “Inflation Targeting in Canada: A Critical Analysis,” by Drew Penner, critically examines claim that inflation targeting would lead to productivity gains and strong growth. The author uses empirical analysis to rebut both claims. Drawing on existing literature, he also challenges the claim that inflation targeting is even responsible for the low inflation observed since the early 1990s, pointing to similar patterns in other countries.
The second paper, entitled “Economie politique de la création monétaire et de la transition écologique: une proposition néochartaliste, ” by Charles Guay-Boutet, is an ambitious attempt to blend an ecological economics perspective with neochartalist theories of banking and state money. The result is a bold recommendation to implement to 100% reserve requirements on banks to limit their ability to lend for the purposes of ecologically-unsustainable private-sector spending while directing more of the macro-economic spending responsibility to the state.
In the undergraduate category, the winning essay was by Gabriel Boothroyd-Roberts, entitled “The Entrepreneurialized University as a Performance of Neoliberalization”. It analyzes two alternative neoliberal reform paths at Simon Fraser University. Gabriel argued that although both reforms reflected a neoliberal trend at SFU in the sense that they emphasized the university’s role in meeting the labour demands of industry, the state mediated industry model had little support from administration while direct industry driven accreditation was more fully embraced.
We also selected an honorable mention in the undergraduate category. This was an essay “Des gommiers du Sahara jusque dans une épicerie près de chez vous” by Alexandre Dubé-Belzile. This fascinating paper traced the supply chain of gum Arabic (from the Acadia tree) from producer to retailer. His careful study of the low and precarious income earned at the bottom of the value chain highlighted the inherent problems of producing low value added products.
Many thanks to this year’s panel of judges, Ian Hudson, Kevin Young, and Marc-André Pigeon.
2015 Essay Contest Results
The graduate winner was Dylan Gowans from the University of Ottawa with his paper Introducing Population Growth and Demography in Demand-led Models of Growth and Accumulation. The paper argues that demographic change, usually neglected within economics, conforms to a heterodox preoccupation with effective demand. Gowans argues that population growth may affect economic growth through a super multiplier process, which he models formally, explicates through simulations that bear these properties out, and suggests a method by which this can be incorporated into Keynesian models of accumulation.
For the undergraduate category we have selected as the winner Sonja Linghui Shan, from the University of Saskatchewan with her paper Social-Economic Analysis on Gender Differences in Time Allocation: A Comparative Analysis of China and Canada. This paper is a really interesting study of the gender differences in the division of labor between men and women using time use data. Using numerous regression techniques, Shan examines how socio-economic characteristics impact time use patterns in paid and unpaid labor of women and men.
We have also selected two honorable mentions in the Undergraduate category. The first is Amelia Duggan, from Simon Fraser University, for her paper Bugs Need Drugs: A Postcolonial Critique of the TRIPS Protocol’s Effects on Drug Accessibility in the Global South. This is a political economy critique of liberal economic policy as carried out by the WTO, using three case studies from India, Brazil and South Africa which highlight the ways in which these countries use their existing policy space.
We also decided to give an honorable mention to Mariana Peres Toledo of Carleton University, for her paper Bees: A Consideration of the Economic Value of Insect Pollination in Ontario. This paper offers an interesting systematic critique of a reaction by the Conference Board to recent Ontario Provincial policy related to pesticide use. Toledo argues that the Conference Board’s paper is not only self-serving to the corn and soybean industry but also neglects to calculate the economic value of pollination services offered by bees in Ontario to the broader horticulture sector in the province.
Thanks again to Kevin Young, Iglika Ivanova, and Rod Hill for serving as the adjudication committee.
2014 Essay Contest Results
The undergraduate prize goes to Alex Wind (UBC). The National Child Benefit: An Examination of the First Fifteen Years of Canada’s Refundable Tax Credit for Low-Income Families with Children evaluates the National Child Benefit, identifies some of its recent failings, and suggests a specific policy augmentation to remedy these, on the basis of a analysis of statistical data.
The Panel decided to award an Honorable Mention to Andrew Lovsin (Laurentian U). His essay, Was the Keynesian Revolution Truly Keynesian? evaluates that very question in light of the historical record of how Keynesian ideas were synthesized, and concludes that, despite a significant impact on the profession and the world, Keynes and his closest followers failed to establish a revolution.
The graduate prize goes to Matt Wilder (University of Toronto), for his essay Internationalization and Variable Confluence in State-Assisted Economic Sectors: Lessons from Canada’s Experience Under Free Trade. This paper examines the disjointed patterns of government retrenchment from different sectors of the Canadian economy as a result of international free trade agreements. The essay covers a wide range of literature and debates, and uses a mix of qualitative and some very sophisticated quantitative evidence to make the inferences about government involvement in the economy in light of various globalization pressures. Wilder finds that while governments abandoned many industrial policy practices following the implementation of free trade agreements, they gradually came to re-engage and navigate an interventionist policy stance in other ways.
The panel decided to give Duncan Farthing-Nichol’s (Harvard Law School) essay an Honorable Mention. Measure Twice, Cut Once: Assessing Labour Availability in Post-Recession Alberta is an analysis of labour shortages in Alberta which critiques the reliability of business-owner (e.g. CFIB) derived data and makes use of CANSIM data to identify real labour shortages and the prescribes policy remedies.
The 2014 essay contest was coordinated by Mathieu Dufour, and judges included Scott Aquanno, Jordan Brennan, and Kevin Young.
2013
Graduate Winner of $1,000: Jamie Moeller, Carleton University, Alternative Options for a Broken Dental Care System in Canada
Graduate Honourable Mentions:
Hadrian Mertins-Kirkwood, Carleton University, Theorizing the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement
John Vogan, York University, Cold Rush: Arctic Offshore Oil Development in Canada
Undergraduate Winner of $500: Collyn Lovelace, Yukon College (University of Regina distance education), Obstacle to a Safe Exit: Domestic Violence & The Whitehorse Housing Crisis
Undergraduate Honourable Mention: Tim Yu, University of Alberta, The Significance of the U.S.-Mexican Remittance Corridor: Bilateral Challenges and Opportunities in Mexico and the United States
Winners were chosen by the following panel:
– Mike Bradfield, Economics Professor, Dalhousie University
– Mathieu Dufour, Economics Professor, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York
– Christine Saulnier, Executive Director, Nova Scotia Office, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
2012
Graduate Winner of $1,000: Jordan Brennan, York University, Differential Accumulation, Redistribution, and the Rebounding Fortunes of the Canadian Establishment
Graduate Honourable Mentions:
Matt Pelling, Simon Fraser University, Failures in Forecasting: An Analysis of Assessment and Expectations 27 Years After the MacDonald Commission Report
Geoff Schneider, University of Manitoba, Sustainable Policy Options for a Canadian Universal Pharmacare Program
Undergraduate Winner of $500: Vanessa Knight, York University, A Fair Return on Non-Renewable Resources: Mandating Reforms for Equitable Distribution
Undergraduate Honourable Mention: Teresa Looy, The King’s University College (Edmonton), Economic solutions to urban sprawl through internalizing externalities
Winners were chosen by the following panel:
– Dr. Brian MacLean, Acting Chair and Full Professor, Department of Economics, Laurentian University
– Linda McQuaig, Toronto Star columnist
– Dr. Kevin Young, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Woodrow Wilson School of Public & International Affairs, Princeton University
2011
Graduate Winner of $1,000: Jordan Brennan, York University, “Has Free Trade Fulfilled its Promise in Canada? Contesting a Sacred Tenet of Globalization Theory”
Graduate Honourable Mention: Rosita Yi Ki Kwan, Dalhousie University, “Alberta Welfare Reform and Employment Outcomes of Welfare Recipients”
Undergraduate Winner of $500: Yilang (Kent) Feng, University of Manitoba, “The Subtle Transformation of Contemporary China – A Study of Chinese Political Economy in the Post-Crisis World”
Undergraduate Honourable Mentions:
Gregory W. Johnsen, Carleton University, “Balancing act: Negotiating global needs and national sovereignty under the Bretton Woods regime”
Laura Husak, University of Manitoba, “The Food Crisis in Context: More than a Problem of Speculation”
Winners were chosen by a panel from the University of Manitoba: Ian Hudson, Fletcher Barager and Robert Chernomas.
2010
Graduate Winner of $1,000: Richard Pereira, Athabasca University, Economic security in the twenty-first century Guaranteed Annual Income: An ecological, democratic, justice and food security imperative (French version here)
Graduate Honourable Mentions:
Richard Togman, Carleton University, The Russian financial crisis of 1998: How uncontrolled markets and a weak government led to the collapse of a nation
Thomas Mastoras, Osgoode Hall Law School, Comity in international political economy: The benefits of trade legalization
Undergraduate Winner of $500: Rob Konkel, University of Saskatchewan, Poverty and HIV/AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa: Alternative formulations and integrated intervention strategies
Undergraduate Honourable Mentions:
Jan Sporina, University of Calgary. Economic prosperity in developing countries: A necessary or a sufficient condition for democratization
Benjamin Sawatzky, University of Manitoba, Stable growth: An examination of the oft-overlooked link between political stability and growth, with special attention to the Kenyan experience
Winners were chosen by Marc Lavoie and Mario Seccareccia from the University of Ottawa.
2009
Graduate Winner of $1,000: Ryan Katz-Rosene, Carleton University, “Tar Sands or Tarred Sense: The Political Economy of Environmentalist Thought”
Graduate Honourable Mention: Salimah Valiani, Carleton University, “Temporary Migration and the Global Integration of Nursing Labour Markets–the US American Instance”
Undergraduate Winner of $500: Derek Carnegie, University of Toronto, “SARB Monetary Policy and South African Financialization”
Undergraduate Honourable Mention: Kellina Higgins, Quest University, “An Economic Proposal to Decrease Agriculture’s Impact on the Environment”
2008
Graduate Winner of $1,000: “Healing a Crisis of Overaccumulation: How Canada’s Public Health Care System is Being Undermined through Accumulation by Disposession” by Heather Whiteside (Simon Fraser University)
Graduate Honourable Mention: “Swedish Child Care and Parental Support Programs – A Defense” by Adrian Scotchmer (written while at Queen’s in the MPA program; now at Osgoode Hall, York University in the LLB)
Undergraduate Winners of $250 each:
“In Pursuit of Sustenance: The Search for Food Security in the 21st Century” by James Barclay Frey (University of Manitoba)
“Ensuring Equality: Guaranteed Annual Income and Democratic Legitimacy” by Evan Rosevear (York University)
2007
Graduate Winner of $1,000: XinYing Hu, Simon Fraser University, “The Rise of Precarious Work for Women in Countries as Different as China and Canada”
Undergraduate Winner of $500: Nick Falvo, York University, “Alternative Approaches to Addressing the Lack of Affordable Housing in Canada”
Undergraduate Honourable Mention: Peter Steele-Mosey, University of Guelph, “Arresting the downward trend in the earnings of new immigrants to Canada. An analysis of the problem, and a prescription for policy”
2006
Undergraduate Winner of $500:
“Should the Central Bank be Independent?” by Zacharie Liman-Tinguiri, University of Ottawa
Graduate Winner of $1000:
“Globalization, Corporatization and the Organic Philosophy: Social Sustainability in Question” by Lisa F. Clark, Simon Fraser University
Graduate Honourable Mentions:
“Getting to the Source of Water Scarcity in Alberta” by Jeremy Schmidt, McGill University
“The General Agreement on Trade in Services and Canadian Federalism: A Threat to Public Education?” by Jennifer Keefe, Simon Fraser University
Winners were chosen by a three-person panel: Marc Lee (Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives-BC); Jim Stanford (Canadian Auto Workers Union); and Fletcher Baragar (University of Manitoba)
2005
Undergraduate Winners of $250 each:
“A Case for Government Owned and Operated Film Theatres in Canada” by Amy Graham, Brock University
“Neoliberalism and the Political Economy of War” by Bruce Guenther, University of Winnipeg
Graduate Winners of $500 each:
“The New Consensus in Monetary Policy: What Role for Post-Keynesian Theory?” by Marcel Turcot, Carleton University
“Lies, Damned Lies, and Trade Statistics: The Import Content of Canadian Exports” by Erin Weir, Queen’s University
Winners were chosen by a three-person panel: Rhonda Kimberley-Young (President of the Ontario Secondary Teachers’ Federation); Arthur Donner (President of Arthur Donner Consultants); and Hugh Mackenzie
2004
Undergraduate Winner of $500: “The deregulation of the telecommunications industry” by Erin Wilson, Concordia University
Graduate Winner of $1000: “Pressure from without, subversion from within: the two-pronged German offensive” by Daniel Kinderman, Cornell University
Winners were chosen by a three-person panel: Ronald J. Bodkin (distinguished retired Professor, Department of Economics, University of Ottawa); Bruce Campbell (Executive Director, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives); Morris Miller (Adjunct Professor, School of Management, University of Ottawa; and former Executive Director, World Bank)
2003
Undergraduate Winner of $500: “An Economic Story: Analysis of Howard J. Sherman’s Nutcracker Theory of Profit Squeeze and Its Ties to Post- Keynesian Economics” by Brandon Schaufele, University of Ottawa
Graduate Winner of $1000: “What Happened to Home Economics?: An Essay on Households, the Economy and the Environment” by Catherine Leviten-Reid, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Winners were chosen by a three-person panel: Cy Gonick, (Editor, Canadian Dimension); Anna Rothney (Economist, Community Economic Development, Manitoba); Todd Scarth (Executive Director, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Manitoba)
2002
Undergraduate Winner of $500: “Economics, Ideology, and Elections: The Political Economy of Saskatchewan Oil Royalties in the 1980s and 1990s” by Erin Weir, University of Regina [Diagrams that accompany the paper are available as a separate PDF file here]
Winner was chosen by a three-person panel: Marjorie Cohen (Professor of Political Science, Simon Fraser University); Michael Liebowitz (Economics Professor, Simon Fraser University); Gideon Rosenbluth (Emeritus Professor of Economics, University of British Columbia, and past president of the Canadian Economics Association).
2001
Undergraduate Winner of $500:
“The Free Market Fails Children: A Discussion of Market Failure and Possible Correctives for the Canadian Child Care System” by Daniel Rosen, McGill University
Undergraduate Honorable Mention:
“NEP to FTA: The Political Economy of Canadian Petroleum Policy in the 1980s” by Erin Weir, University of Regina
Graduate Winners of $500 each:
“The Janus-faced Nature of Working-time Reduction: Between Rationalization Whip and Instrument for Social Justice” by Daniel Kinderman, York University
“Living in the Age of Exclusion: The Impact of Corporate Globalization on Rural Communities” by Jennifer Sumner, University of Guelph
Winners were chosen by a three-person panel: David Foot (author of the best-selling Boom, Bust and Echo and Professor of Economics, University of Toronto); Thomas Walkom (economist and columnist with the Toronto Star); Barbara Cameron (professor of women’s studies at York University).
2000
“It Happened but not Again: A Minskian Analysis of Japan’s Lost Decade” by Marc-Andre Pigeon, New School University
Honourable mentions:
“Building a New Strategy for the Left Around Capital Controls” by Richard Lennon, York University
“Driving International Environmental Co-operation: The Role of Incentives in the Creation of the Montreal and Kyoto Protocols“ by Michael Lisowski, University of Toronto
“Challenging the Corporate Law Tradition: A Socialist Feminist Critique” by Veronica Wylie, Osgoode Hall Law School
Winners were chosen by Mel Watkins (Professor Emeritus of Economics, University of Toronto); Linda McQuaig (author and columnist); Sam Gindin (former Research Director of the Canadian Auto Workers)