Dr. Diana Thomas is an assistant professor of Economics at the Jon M. Huntsman School of Business at Utah State University. A German native, she earned her Diploma in Business Administration from Fachhochschule Aachen and her BS in Finance from George Mason University. After gaining some experience as a junior portfolio manager at a mutual fund management company in Frankfurt, Germany, Dr. Thomas returned to George Mason University to complete her MA and PhD in Economics. She moved to Utah State University in the Fall of 2009 and has since then primarily taught classes in International Economics. Her primary fields of research are in the areas of public choice and Austrian economics. In her work, Dr. Thomas explores the role political entrepreneurs play in changing the formal and informal rules that govern economic exchange in society. She has published papers on the regulation of late medieval German beer markets, regulation of child care markets, prohibition repeal, the Troubled Asset Relief Program, and the role political entrepreneurs play in bringing about institutional change more generally.
Topics:
- Intro to Public Choice: Ignorance, Irrationality, and Intransitivity
- Market vs. Government Failure
- Institutions and Economic Performance
- Institutional Change and Political Entrepreneurship
- How Childcare Regulation Harms Women
- The Regressive Effects of Regulation
- Beer in the Beehive: Alcohol Prohibition in Utah
- Efficient Regulation? – Markets for Blood in the United States
- Hope and Change in the Obama Administration’s Antitrust Policies (First Term)
- The Brewer, the Baker, and the Monopoly Maker – How Regulation of Beer Markets in Late Medieval Germany Hurt Consumers
- School Choice – Basic overview over theory, policy, and empirics
