Dr. Ying Zhen

Dr. Zhen is a full professor of economics at Wesleyan College. Her major fields of specialization are Labor Economics, Industrial Organization and Cultural Economics. Her specific research interests include Economics of Immigration and Music Business. After getting tenure in 2018, Dr. Zhen has been focusing on studying the music industry, and published papers in top-tier journals such as the Journal of Cultural Economics. She was invited by Georgia Southern University to give a music industry seminar in September 2023. She co-authored a book with Routledge in 2024:  “Artists and Markets in Music: The Political Economy of Music During the Covid Era and Beyond”.  She considers economics a universal science, which should be open to everyone. Her ultimate goal is to help students see the world through the eyes of an economist, making them appreciate the beauty of economics and become civilized world citizens.

If you recall, what influenced your decision to become a member of the International Atlantic Economic Society?

I have been serving as a First Panel Judge for the Annual Best Undergraduate Paper Award Competition by the International Atlantic Economic Society (IAES) yearly since 2014. I have been very impressed by the high quality of papers submitted by the undergraduates. I also know that N. Gregory Mankiw serves as the IAES’ Vice-President, a world-famous economist that I have known since I was a freshman in college and I have met him in person several times at conferences since 2015. I look forward to reading more articles in the IAES journals and would like to try my luck there as well!

What types of projects/research are you currently working on and what inspired/motivated you to pursue these interests?

I’m currently working on a paper exploring the relationship between English proficiency and the success of Latino musicians during the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States, with my co-author Cameron M. Weber, who is the lead author of our book with Routledge in 2024. In our book, we conducted a grassroots snowball survey on musicians from January to August 2022, which shows that the labor union cohort says English proficiency is more important than other cohorts, which is true for Latino musicians. We would like to explore more about it.

What advice would you give to someone who is considering entering your line of work/field of study?

As my current research interest mainly lies in cultural economics (a field that analyzes the economic aspects of specific cultural sectors like performing arts, visual arts, and other forms of creative industries), especially the music industry, it would be great if economics and music are the top two passions of your life (just like me!) Your love of music will infuse a big passion into your economics research of music. 

Going forward, what other projects/research are you planning to or hoping to pursue?

In addition to collecting longitudinal data that may facilitate our study of the book topic post pandemic, it would be great if I could examine interdisciplinary topics from an economics perspective, with a focus on cultural economics.

What’s your favorite hobby?

I have been a hobby keyboard/piano player since I was 6 years old.  In addition to playing the classical pieces, I love improvisations on various types of music, from music for TV shows both domestic and international, such as Game of Thrones, The Legend of White Snake (China), and Autumn in My Heart (South Korea) and music for video games, such as Super Marios and Contra, to Jewish music (influenced by my Jewish friends).