Plenary Speakers and State of the Art Lecturers

Plenary Speakers

Jeremy Rudin

Was appointed Assistant Deputy Minister of the Financial Sector Policy Branch at Finance Canada in 2008, after serving as General Director since 2006.

The branch’s responsibilities cover a wide range of issues including: policy and legislation governing federally-regulated financial institutions and financial stability more broadly, supporting access to financing, payments system policy, the management of the government’s market debt and international reserves, and strategies to eliminate money laundering and terrorism financing.

Jeremy joined Finance Canada in the Economic and Fiscal Policy Branch in 1993. He held a number of positions in that branch, where he was General Director from 2001 to 2004. In that role, he was closely involved in the development of the federal budget. He has also been Director, Funds Management in the Financial Markets Department of the Bank of Canada.

Before joining the public service, he taught economics at the University of British Columbia and Queen’s University, during which time he co-authored a leading textbook on Canadian macroeconomics. He holds a B.A. from the University of Toronto, an M.C.R.P. from Harvard University and a Ph.D. in economics from Stanford University.

Claire Plateau

Is Assistant to the Head of the Statistical Coordination Department at INSEE. She is coordinating INSEE’s work in the implementation of the Stiglitz Commission’s recommendations on the development of sustainable development, economic performance and social progress indicators in France and in other countries where OECD or the European Union have launched international initiatives.

She graduated from the École polytechnique and from the École nationale de la statistique et de l’administration économique (ENSAE). She also holds a DEA in monetary economics.

Claire Plateau began her career at INSEE in 1981 as head of the Energy Mini DMS model in the Economic Branch. She was then responsible for the development of this model that takes into account interactions between economic activity and energy. She also looked at the model’s implementation for the medium-term projections made under the VIII Plan. From 1986 to 2000, she was on parental leave. In 2000, she joined the Statistical Branch of the Ministry of Industry where she was responsible for globalization studies. From 2003 to 2006, she was Chief of the Housing and Real Estate Office in the Statistical Branch of the Ministry of Transport, Infrastructure, Tourism and Sea. She was then in charge of the satellite account on housing and real estate studies. In July 2006, she joined INSEE as Head of the Agriculture Division where she was in charge of the agricultural accounts and studies. Since 2008, she is deputy head for the Department of registries, statistical and structural infrastructures and she is the head of the enterprise directory SIRENE.

Malcolm Hamilton

Is a Principal and Worldwide partner of Mercer. He specializes in the design and funding of employee benefit plans in both the private and public sectors, with particular emphasis on registered pension and savings plans, unregistered pension plans, and retirement compensation arrangements. His clients include the Colleges of Applied Arts and Technology, the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, Hydro One, Ontario Power Generation, the Bank of Montreal and Manulife.

Malcolm graduated from Queens University in 1972 as the Gold Medallist in Mathematics. He attended McGill as a National Research Council scholar, receiving his M.Sc. in 1975. He became a Fellow of the Canadian Institute of Actuaries and a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries in 1977. He is a frequent speaker at pension conferences, and has had papers published by the Canadian Investment Review, Benefits Canada and the Canadian Tax Foundation.

Keith Banting

Is a Professor in the School of Policy Studies and the Department of Political Studies at Queen’s University, and holder of the Queen’s Research Chair in Public Policy. He earned his BA (Hon) from Queen’s University, and completed his doctorate at Oxford University. He began his teaching career at the University of British Columbia, and later moved to Queen’s University where he served as Director of the School of Policy Studies from 1992 to 2003. In addition, he has been a visiting scholar at the London School of Economics, the Brookings Institution, Harvard University, Oxford University, the European University Institute and the University of Melbourne. Dr. Banting was appointed as a member of the Order of Canada in 2005.

Dr. Banting’s research interests focus on public policy in Canada and other western nations. He is the author of Poverty, Politics and Policy (Macmillan) and The Welfare State and Canadian Federalism (McGill-Queen’s University Press). In addition, he is the editor or co-editor of another 15 books on policy issues. His current research focuses on ethnic diversity, multiculturalism and the welfare state. In this field, he is co-editor (with Will Kymlicka) of Multiculturalism and the Welfare State: Recognition and Redistribution in Contemporary Democracies (Oxford University Press), and co-editor (with Thomas Courchene and Leslie Seidle) of Belonging? Diversity, Recognition and Shared Citizenship in Canada (Institute for Research on Public Policy).

State of the Art Lecturers

Claude Montmarquette holds a PhD in economics from the University of Chicago and is Professor emeritus of economy at the Université de Montreal. He holds the Bell-Caisse de dépot Chair on experimental economics at this same university. Dr Montmarquette is also CEO and vice-president for public policy at CIRANO.

He authored or co-authored 8 books on economics and more than 70 scientific papers published in various journals. Dr Montmarquette is also known for publishing public economic statements which are often debated in public and governmental forum. He was invited professor in many European and American universities and authored over a hundred seminars and scientific lectures on various economic topics.

Dr Montmarquette was director of the Centre for Economic research and Development (CRDE) in Montreal and was involved in many research and university management boards. He has been a member of a number of government advisory bodies including the National Statistics Council of Statistics Canada and the Commissariat général du plan in France. He was a member of the recent Advisory Committee on Economy and Public Finance for the Quebec department of Finance.

Arthur Sweetman is a Professor in the School of Policy Studies at Queen's University. He is cross-appointed in the Department of Economics, and in the Department of Community Health and Epidemiology. Prof. Sweetman holds a Doctorate in Economics from McMaster University.

His research interests focus primarily on empirical economic issues related to labour market, social, and health policy. He has co-edited a number of books including:

• Fulfilling Potential, Creating Success: Perspectives on Human Capital Development;
• Health Services Restructuring in Canada: New Evidence and New Directions;
• Who Goes? Who Stays? What Matters? Accessing and Persisting in Post-Secondary Education in Canada; and
• Canadian Immigration: Economic Evidence for a Dynamic Policy Environment.

Other recent research topics include quantitative program evaluation, health policy, poverty, employment insurance, microfinance, mental health services reform, and infectious disease outbreaks.

Dr. Michael C. Wolfson graduated from the University of Toronto in mathematics, computer science and economics. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Cambridge University and was recently awarded a Canada Research Chair in Population Health Modeling / Populomics in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ottawa.

Dr. Wolfson’s areas of expertise are diverse and include program review and evaluation, tax/transfer policy, pension policy, income distribution, design of health information systems, microsimulation modeling of socio-economic policy and health dynamics, and analysis of the determinants of health. Dr. Wolfson has authored numerous articles in various journals including the British Medical Journal, the Canadian Journal of Economics, the Monthly Labor Review, the World Health Statistics Quarterly and the International Journal of Epidemiology.

Dr. Wolfson has held positions in various federal government departments including the Treasury Board Secretariat, Finance Canada, the Privy Council Office, the House of Commons, and the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada’s Office. He recently retired as Assistant Chief Statistician, Analysis and Development, at Statistics Canada. He was also a Fellow of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research Program in Population Health from 1988 to 2003, and more recently of the Federal Public Service Pension Plan Advisory Committee. He is currently Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, and a member of the International Statistical Institute.

Dr. Peter Victor is an economist who has worked on environmental issues for over 40 years as an academic, consultant and public servant. By extending input-output analysis, he was the first economist to apply the physical law of the conservation of matter to the empirical analysis of a national economy. Dr. Victor was one of the founders of the emerging discipline of ecological economics and was the first President of the Canadian Society for Ecological Economics. His most recent book is Managing without Growth. Slower by Design, not Disaster. (Edward Elgar, 2008).

Dr. Victor is a Professor in Environmental Studies at York University and from 1996 to 2001 was Dean of the Faculty of Environmental Studies. This followed several years as Assistant Deputy Minister of the Environmental Sciences and Standards Division in the Ontario Ministry of the Environment. Prior to that Dr. Victor was a principal of VHB Consulting and Victor and Burrell Research and Consulting where he undertook many influential policy-related economic studies in Canada and abroad. He has continued to provide technical advice in such areas as air pollution and health, emissions trading, emerging issues and education for sustainable energy development.

Dr. Victor has served on numerous boards and advisory committees and he has appeared as an expert witness before various Commissions. From 2000 to 2004 he was President of the Royal Canadian Institute for the Advancement of Science, Canada’s oldest science organization, and from 2004-2006 he was Chair of Environment Canada’s Science and Technology Advisory Board. Currently he is a member of the Advisory Committee on the National Accounts for Statistics Canada, the Academic Advisory Panel of TruCost, the Board of the David Suzuki Foundation, and the editorial advisory board of several journals.