Ross Levine

About

Ross Levine is the Booth Derbas Family/Edward Lazear Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. Previously a faculty member at the University of California, Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, Levine now co-directs Hoover’s Working Group on Financial Regulation.

Levine’s research sheds light on how financial regulations and the operation of financial systems shape economic prosperity, including economic growth and stability, technological innovation, entrepreneurship, the economic opportunities available to individuals, poverty, income distribution, and the environment. In addition to authoring or editing six books, he has published almost 200 articles in premier economics, finance, and management journals.

Two of his books, Rethinking Bank Regulation: Till Angels Govern and Guardians of Finance: Making Regulators Work for Us, and scores of his articles underscore the complexities of regulatory policies. He shows that regulatory policies often impede competition, harm the efficient allocation of capital, and encourage excessive risk-taking, adversely affecting living standards.

Levine’s research resonates beyond academia, shaping dialogue and policies at prominent international institutions such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and European Central Bank. He serves as an advisor to central banks and regulatory authorities across the globe, and his work has been featured in major media, including the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and the Economist.

Having earned a BA from Cornell University and a PhD in economics from UCLA, Levine worked at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the World Bank, where he conducted and managed research and operational programs. In addition to his research and policy contributions, Levine has won several teaching awards at Berkeley and Brown University.