where innovative

ideas

meet cutting-edge

analysis

The Greatest Good is a unique firm formed with the goal of applying rigorous, cutting-edge data analysis and economic methods to the most salient problems in business. Our founders are an elite group of leading economists, including Andrew Rosenfield, a pioneer in using economics to analyze legal and business issues, Steven Levitt, author of the best-selling Freakonomics books, and John List, the world's foremost experimental economist.

experimental

pioneers

data-driven

results

Our greatest strength is the ability not just to analyze data but to do so differently and imaginatively — to look at data in ways others would not. In particular, members of our team have built their careers around isolating and analyzing data with attention to "natural experiments" that arise from accidents of history or policy and that allow a causal interpretation, as opposed to observation of mere correlation and coincidence.

We also are strong proponents of and leaders in creating field experiments, which, if properly designed, have the virtue of being very inexpensive ways to investigate new ideas and strategies, pose little or no business risk, and, when done with proper attention to statistical and scientific method, usually generate fast and highly reliable feedback and insight. Our team includes the world’s leaders in the new practice of field experimentation, giving our clients access to cutting-edge methods and techniques that are not yet in general application. We have conducted dozens of successful field experiments, covering aspects as varied as pricing, marketing, hiring, incentives, health care, and wellness.

world-renowned

experts

our founding

partners

Our core team consists of more than a dozen leading academic economists, psychologists, econometricians, and experimentalists and a related full-time staff of experts, all with unique skills and abilities. Our firm includes many of the very best economists in the world (including Nobel Prize laureates), with a wide range of expertise in applied price theory, econometrics, analysis of large data sets, behavioral economics, psychology, and the implementation of field tests and experiments.

Additionally, we have assembled an international cadre of award-winning thought leaders from diverse disciplines — medicine, technology, and engineering, to name only a few — who are able to work with our clients to generate new solutions to the most intractable problems, all in the quest to effect meaningful change.

interdisciplinary

leaders

our diverse

team

Daron Acemoglu

Professor of economics at MIT
John Bates Clark Medalist

Raj Chetty

Professor of economics at Harvard University
Named by The Economist as one of the top 8 young economists in the world

Atul Gawande

Associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School
MacArthur Fellow and author of best-sellers Complications, Better, and The Checklist Manifesto

Edward Glaeser

Professor of economics at Harvard University
Director of the Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston at the John F. Kennedy School of Government

David Laibson

Professor of economics at Harvard University
Former Marshall Scholar

Franziska Michor

Associate professor of computational biology
Dana-Farber Cancer Center and Harvard School of Public Health

Nathan Myhrvold

Co-founder of Intellectual Ventures
Former Chief Technology Officer at Microsoft Corporation

Emily Oster

Associate professor of economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research

Steven Pinker

Professor of experimental psychology at Harvard University
Author of best-sellers The Language Instinct, How the Mind Works, and The Blank Slate

Raghuram Rajan

Professor of finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Former Chief Economist at the IMF
Economic advisor to the Prime Minister of India

Lisa Randall

Professor of physics at Harvard University
Co-creator of the Randall-Sundrum models

Jesse Shapiro

Professor of economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Named by The Economist as one of the top 8 young economists in the world

Andrei Shleifer

Professor of economics at Harvard University
John Bates Clark Medalist

Cass Sunstein

Felix Frankfurter professor of law at Harvard University
Former administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs
Co-author of best-seller Nudge

Richard Thaler

Professor of behavioral science and economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Co-author of best-seller Nudge

Sudhir Venkatesh

Professor of sociology at Columbia University
Author of best-seller Gang Leader for a Day

Andrew Rosenfield, an economist and lawyer, began his career as Co-Founder and Chief Executive of Lexecon Inc., an early and leading "law and economics" consulting firm, which he led for over two decades until its sale to a public company. Mr. Rosenfield directed hundreds of economic studies in many industries and worked on mergers and acquisitions, regulatory matters, commercial disputes, and restructurings in the telecommunications, pharma, automotive, technology, consumer products, and financial services industries.

He is Senior Lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School, where he has taught for 25 years, and a Managing Partner of Guggenheim Partners. Mr. Rosenfield was educated at Kenyon College, Harvard University, the University of Chicago, and the University of Chicago Law School.

ar@greatestgood.com

Steve Levitt is the William B. Ogden Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago and is one of the world’s best-known and most innovative economists. He is the 2003 winner of the John Bates Clark Medal, awarded to the best economist in America under the age of 40. In his academic research, Mr. Levitt has used powerful econometric and investigatory methods to study a famously eclectic range of topics, including cheating sumo wrestlers, the economics of crack-selling gangs, and the link between legalized abortion and crime.

Most recently, he has turned his attention to helping complex organizations make better decisions by better understanding and analyzing their data. Mr. Levitt has advised Fortune 500 companies, non-profits, and international intelligence services tracking terrorists. He summarized his work in the best-selling books Freakonomics and SuperFreakonomics. Mr. Levitt received his BA from Harvard University and his PhD from MIT, both in economics.

levitt@greatestgood.com

Gary Becker is judged by many to be the most influential economist alive. He pioneered the economic study of "non-market" topics such as racial discrimination, crime, and the economics of the family. He is one of the foremost experts in the field of human capital, a field he created. Mr. Becker’s numerous awards include the John Bates Clark Medal (1967), the Nobel Prize in Economics (1992), the National Medal of Science (2000), and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2007). He holds joint appointments with the departments of economics, sociology, and the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago.

He is as well one of the founders of the Becker Center on Chicago Price Theory, a research branch of the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business that explores the fundamental effect of markets and incentives on human behavior. Mr. Becker holds degrees from Princeton University and the University of Chicago, both in economics.

becker@greatestgood.com

Daniel Kahneman stands out among Nobel laureates in economics, and not just because he has revolutionized the field: because he is not an economist, he is a psychologist, and perhaps the most distinguished psychologist in the world. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics (2002) for integrating insights from psychological research into economics and in particular for his contribution in creating "prospect theory." He has also received every major award in the field of psychology including the American Psychological Association's Award for Outstanding Lifetime Contributions to Psychology (2007). His findings challenged some of the most basic assumptions of neoclassical economics and generated an entirely new field within the discipline, behavioral economics, which studies the psychology of judgment and decision-making.

Mr. Kahneman, who was born in Israel, received undergraduate degrees in psychology and mathematics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He later received a PhD in psychology from the University of California, Berkeley. He is professor emeritus of psychology and public affairs at Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School.

kahneman@greatestgood.com

John List is Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago and is acknowledged as one of the world's leading experts on experimental economics. Mr. List is best known for his pioneering work in the use of field experiments to test economic theory directly in the marketplace. His research has provided new insights into the impact of environmental regulation, prospect theory, the use of lotteries to raise money for public goods, competition differences between men and women, and the economics of charitable giving.

Mr. List is a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and previously served as Senior Economist on the President's Council of Economic Advisors for Environmental and Resource Economics, where he worked to develop multi-national market institutions to address climate change. He holds a BS from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point and a PhD in economics from the University of Wyoming.

list@greatestgood.com

Chad Syverson is Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. He is an expert in industrial organization, with particular focus on the interactions of firm structure, market structure, and productivity. Mr. Syverson’s research includes studies on the incumbent response to entry threat in the airline industry, the value of information in real estate transactions, and the effects of vertical integration in the cement industry.

Mr. Syverson earned dual bachelor's degrees from the University of North Dakota, one in economics and one in mechanical engineering. He holds a master's degree and a PhD, both in economics, from the University of Maryland.

syverson@greatestgood.com

Roland Fryer, Jr., is the Robert M. Beren Professor of Economics at Harvard University and the CEO of the Education Innovation Laboratory. He is best known for his path-breaking work in applying financial incentives to education. His leadership has been instrumental in Harlem Children’s Zone’s much-lauded success in making meaningful strides toward closing the educational achievement gap in poor-performing inner-city schools. Mr. Fryer has published papers on topics such as the racial achievement gap, the causes and consequences of distinctively black names, affirmative action, and the impact of the crack cocaine epidemic.

In January 2008, Mr. Fryer became the youngest African-American to receive tenure from Harvard University. His work has been profiled in almost every major US newspaper and most recently was featured as the cover story in Time magazine. Mr. Fryer received his bachelor's degree from the University of Texas and holds a PhD in economics from Penn State.

fryer@greatestgood.com