Manfred Keil, Ph.D.

Manfred Keil, Ph.D.

Associate Director of the Lowe Institute of Political Economy

Dr. Manfred Keil is Associate Director of the Lowe Institute of Political Economy and Associate Professor of Economics at Claremont McKenna College. He is also a member of the Council of Economic Advisors for the California State Controller’s Office, where he advises State Controller Malia Cohen on economic policy issues facing California. He serves as Chief Economist for the Inland Empire Economic Partnership (IEEP) and is an Economic Advisor for the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG).

Dr. Keil has led the Lowe Institute’s analysis and forecasting of economic activity in the Inland Empire since the project began in 2009. Working with teams of student research assistants, he produces the Institute’s annual State of the Region economic report as well as regular analyses of labor markets and economic conditions in the Inland Empire, Southern California, California, and the broader U.S. economy. His work is regularly used to inform business, government, and community leaders about regional economic trends and prospects.

Dr. Keil teaches statistics, econometrics, and macroeconomics at CMC. He has also lectured at Claremont Graduate University, Pomona College, and Scripps College, and is a fellow of the Rose Institute of State and Local Government. He has been involved in advancing data science and quantitative education across The Claremont Colleges and has taught in CMC’s international and domestic programs, including the CMC-Yonsei University program in Seoul and the CMC Silicon Valley Program.

Dr. Keil received his Ph.D. in Economics from the London School of Economics in 1985 and has been a Fulbright Scholar. He joined Claremont McKenna College in 1995 after holding academic appointments in Montreal, Boston, and Essex, England. His research interests include comparative economic performance across geographic areas, economic forecasting, labor markets, and the interaction between political and economic forces.

His recent work focuses particularly on regional economic performance, labor markets, population and migration trends, inflation, economic growth, and the economic outlook for California and Southern California. Through his research and public service, Dr. Keil brings academic economic analysis directly to current policy and economic challenges facing the state and region.

Dr. Keil's research has appeared in journals and edited volumes including the Journal of Macroeconomics, Journal of Development Economics, Journal of Applied Econometrics, Oxford Economic Papers, Canadian Public Policy, and the Southern Economic Journal. His scholarship has examined economic forecasting, labor markets and unemployment, inflation and economic growth, international finance, capital mobility, exchange rate regimes, and political business cycles.

He is also the author and co-author of numerous recent economic reports and analyses on the Inland Empire, Southern California, California, and national economic conditions, including the Lowe Institute’s annual State of the Region report and regular labor market and economic outlook reports.

Research and Publications

• "Minimum Wages and Employment" (with Donald Robertson and James Symons), work in progress.
• “Uncovered Interest Rate Parity and Exchange Rate Regimes: Lessons from a Sample of East Asian Countries.” Forthcoming, conference volume, SCAPE, National University of Singapore, 2008.
• “International and Intra Regional Interest Rate Interdependence in Asia: Methodological Issues and Empirical Results,” in Conference Volume, Korea Institute for International Policy (KIEP), 2005, with Amnat Phalapleewan, Ramkishen Rajan, and Thomas Willett.
• “Shrunken Earnings Predictions are Better Predictions,” with Margaret Hwang and Gary Smith, Applied Financial Economics, 2004.
• "When Does Inflation Hurt Economic Growth? Different Nonlinearities for Different Economies" (with Richard C. K. Burdekin, Arthur T. Denzau, Thitithep Sitthiyot, and Thomas D. Willett), Journal of Macroeconomics, 2004.
• “Political Business Cycles,” in F. Schneider and C. Rowley (eds.), Encyclopedia of Public Choice, 2003 (with Tom Willett).
• "Capital Mobility for Developing Countries May Not Be So High" (with Thomas D. Willett and Young Seok Ahn), Journal of Development Economics, 2002.
• "The Sources of Unemployment in Canada, 1967-1991: Evidence from a Panel of Regions and Demographic Groups," (with Pierre Fortin and James Symons), Oxford Economic Papers, 2001.
• “Mean Reversion Recast as Measurement Error: Lessons for Finance from Galton’s Fallacy.” Papers and Proceedings, Western Decision Science Institute, Annual Meetings, 2000.
• “An Explanation of the Recently Experienced Fall in the Natural Rate of Unemployment,” Papers and Proceedings, Western Decision Science Institute, Annual Meetings, 1999.
• "Canadian and U.S. Unemployment Rates: A Comparison Based on Regional Data," Canadian Public Policy, 1997.
• "An Aggregate Model of the Canadian Labor Market," Journal of Macroeconomics, 1994.
• “Canadian and U.S. Unemployment Rates: A Comparison Based on Regional Data,” with Lou Pantuosco. Canadian Public Policy, Supplement, 1998.
• “Lessons from the OECD Experience of Unemployment” with Andrew Newell. Labour Market Review, Winter 1993/4, pp. 50-61.
• "Internal Migration and Unemployment in Germany: An Anglo-Irish Perspective," Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv, 1993.
• "A Comparison Among Partial Adjustment, Rational Expectations and Error Correction Estimates of the Canadian Demand for Money," Journal of Applied Econometrics, 1990.
• "Is the Political Business Cycle Really Dead?" Southern Economic Journal, 1988