Academics

Jonathan Eaton elected to American Academy of Arts and Sciences

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Jonathan Eaton, Penn State distinguished professor of economics, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Eaton is one of 228 newly elected members, and one of two Penn Staters, announced on April 12. Squire J. Booker, professor of chemistry and of biochemistry and molecular biology, was also elected from Penn State.  

The American Academy of Arts and Sciences, founded in 1780, is one of the country’s oldest and most prestigious learned societies. Within the 2017 class alone, members include Pulitzer Prize winners, MacArthur Fellows, Fields medalists, Presidential Medal of Freedom and National Medal of Arts recipients, as well as Grammy, Emmy, Tony and Academy award winners.

“In a tradition reaching back to the earliest days of our nation, the honor of election to the American Academy is also a call to service,” said Jonathan F. Fanton, president of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In its function as an independent policy research center, academy members respond to challenges facing the nation and the world.

Eaton’s research focuses on international trade and, more recently, its relationship with technology. Eaton was elected a Fellow of the Econometric Society in 1995; his 2004 article, “Technology, Geography, and Trade,” written with Samuel Kortum, earned them both the Frisch Medal in economics.

Eaton co-authored with the Kortum the 2010 book, “Technology in the Global Economy: A Framework for Quantitative Analysis,” and has published numerous peer-reviewed journal articles, book chapters, and book reviews. In 2013, Eaton gave the prestigious Ohlin Lecture at the Stockholm School of Economics on “Trade Networks.”

In response to his election to the academy, Eaton said, “I’m grateful for this honor. In establishing the academy in 1780, America’s founders recognized the importance of art and science in advancing ‘a free people.’ It’s wonderful to be working at a great public research university that’s part of this contribution.”

Eaton came to Penn State in 2009 as a liberal arts research professor and was named a distinguished professor in 2016. Before coming to Penn State, he also served on the faculty at Princeton University, Yale University, and Brown University, where he was the William R. Rhodes Professor of International Economics and director of the William R. Rhodes Center for International Economics and Finance.

Eaton and Booker will be inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences on Oct. 7 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Last Updated April 19, 2017