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Daniel Ho, Muriel Niederle elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

SIEPR senior fellows Daniel Ho and Muriel Niederle join a distinguished group of members who are recognized for excellence and leadership in work that advances the common good.

Daniel Ho and Muriel Niederle, senior fellows at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR), are among seven Stanford scholars elected this year to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

The Academy elected 250 new members in 2024 to honor their exceptional achievements in advancing knowledge and applying knowledge to the problems of society.

When announcing the new members, Academy President David W. Oxtoby said, “We honor these artists, scholars, scientists, and leaders in the public, nonprofit, and private sectors for their accomplishments and for the curiosity, creativity, and courage required to reach new heights. We invite these exceptional individuals to join in the Academy’s work to address serious challenges and advance the common good.”

Bridging scholarship and policy

Ho, the William Benjamin Scott and Luna M. Scott Professor of Law in the Stanford Law School and professor of political science in the School of Humanities and Sciences, is also professor, by courtesy, of computer science in the School of Engineering, a senior fellow at Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI) and director of the Regulation, Evaluation, and Governance Lab (RegLab).

His scholarship centers on quantitative empirical legal studies and focuses on administrative law, regulatory policy, and antidiscrimination law. 

SIEPR Senior Fellow Daniel Ho testifies before the U.S. House Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation on Dec. 6, 2023. (Photo courtesy of Stanford Law School)

In his policy work, he serves on the National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee (NAIAC), advising the White House on AI policy; as Senior Advisor on Responsible AI at the U.S. Department of Labor; on the Committee on National Statistics (CNSTAT) of the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine; as a Public Member of the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS); and as Special Advisor to the ABA Task Force on Law and Artificial Intelligence.

With the RegLab, Ho has developed high-impact projects through partnerships with a range of government agencies, including the Internal Revenue Service, the Treasury Department, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Labor.

His recent research, for instance, found disproportionate audits of Black taxpayers and has spurred IRS reforms. And he has testified on Capitol Hill and before the California State Senate on governance matters related to AI.

Probing gender-related impacts and implications 

Niederle is the Pauline K. Levin-Robert L. Levin and Pauline C. Levin-Abraham Levin Professor in the Department of Economics in the School of Humanities and Sciences.

Her groundbreaking work in experimental economics and research of gender differences in the labor market has received international attention. In 2021, she received the Oskar Morgenstern Medal for her achievements in the field of economics. She was the fifth recipient of the medal and the first woman to receive the honor.

SIEPR Senior Fellow Muriel Niederle receives the Oskar Morgenstern Medal from Jean-Robert Tyran of the University of Vienna, at an award ceremony held in Vienna, Austria on October 7, 2021. (Photo by fotografiefetz)

Niederle’s research has shed light on behaviors and competitive factors underlying gender differences in education choices and labor market outcomes. In a paper published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics in 2014, for instance, Niederle and her co-authors measured the competitiveness of roughly 400 ninth-graders from schools in Amsterdam using the "Niederle-Vesterlund" design.

Niederle also investigates the policy implications of her research findings. One of her recent papers explores the trickle-down effects of affirmative action.

Ho and Niederle are now among the illustrious Academy members who came before them, including Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, Margaret Mead, and Martin Luther King, Jr., among many others.

“With the broad diversity of members elected this year, we are continuing to expand on the commitment to excellence and wide-ranging expertise established by our founders,” said the Academy’s Board Chair, Goodwin Liu, associate justice of the California Supreme Court. “The honor of election comes with an invitation for new members to rededicate themselves to the common good by advancing the Academy’s nonpartisan, cross-disciplinary work in the arts, democracy, education, global affairs, and science.”

Read the story in Stanford Report for the full list of Stanford scholars named this year to the Academy.

 

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