Susan Mayer, Ph.D.

Susan E. Mayer, a professor in the Harris School and the College, served as dean of the Harris School from 2002 to 2009. She has published numerous articles and book chapters on the measurement of poverty, the effect of growing up in poor neighborhoods, and the effect of parental income on children's well-being. She is currently doing research on intergenerational economic mobility, having recently published, "Has the Intergenerational Transmission of Economic Status Changed?" (Journal of Human Resources) and "Government Spending and Intergenerational Mobility" (Journal of Public Economics), among other papers on this topic, and on improving educational outcomes in developing countries.

Mayer is a member of the Board of Directors of Chapin Hall Center for Children and the General Accounting Office Educators' Advisory Panel. She has been a member of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on National Statistics Panel to Review U.S. Department of Agriculture's Measurement of Food Insecurity and Hunger, and the Committee on Standards of Evidence and the Quality of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research. Mayer is the past director and deputy director of the Northwestern University/University of Chicago Joint Center for Poverty Research. She has served as an associate editor for the American Journal of Sociology.