Stephen Moore is FreedomWorks’ Senior Economist. He communicates FreedomWorks’ vision for a pro-growth economic agenda to grassroots activists and media nationwide, as well as conducting original economic analysis. Formerly, he has served as a Senior Economic Adviser to President Donald Trump, where he focused on tax reform, regulatory reform and energy policy. Prior to that, he was the Senior Economics Writer on the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board, a senior economist at the Congressional Joint Economic Committee, and as a senior economics fellow at the Cato Institute, where he published dozens of studies on federal and state fiscal policy. He advised the National Economic Commission in 1987, and served as a research director for President Reagan’s Commission on Privatization.

Jonathan Williams is the Chief Economist and Vice President for the Center for State Fiscal Reform at the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), where he works with state policymakers, congressional leaders and members of the private sector to develop fiscal policy solutions for the states. Williams also co-authors Rich States, Poor States: ALEC-Laffer Economic State Competitiveness Index with Reagan economist Dr. Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore. Prior to joining ALEC, Williams served as staff economist at the nonpartisan Tax Foundation, authoring numerous tax policy studies.

Williams’s work has appeared in many publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes and Investor’s Business Daily. He is a contributing columnist to Tax Analysts, the leading provider of tax news and analysis for the global community. He has written for the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. In addition, Williams was a contributing author of In Defense of Capitalism (Northwood University Press).

Williams has testified before numerous legislative bodies and spoken to audiences across America. He is frequent guest on talk radio shows and has appeared on numerous television outlets, including the PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Fox Business News and Bloomberg News. Williams was also the recipient of the prestigious Ludwig von Mises Award in Economics.

Art Carden is a professor of economics at Samford University’s Brock School of Business. He is also a senior fellow with the American Institute for Economic Research and the Fraser Institute; a research fellow with the Independent Institute; a senior fellow with the Beacon Center of Tennessee; a senior research fellow with the Institute for Faith, Work, and Economics; and co-editor of the Southern Economic Journal. His research on mass-market retailers, economic history, and the history of economic ideas has appeared in journals like the Southern Economic Journal, Journal of Urban Economics, Public Choice, and Contemporary Economic Policy. He is a contributor to Forbes.com, and his commentaries and other articles have appeared in USA Today, Productive!, Black Belt, and many other outlets. He earned a B.S. and M.A. from the University of Alabama and an A.M. and Ph.D. from Washington University in Saint Louis. Before joining the faculty at Samford, Carden taught economics at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee. His first book, coauthored with Deirdre McCloskey and titled Leave Me Alone and I’ll Make You Rich How the Bourgeois Deal Enriched the World, published by the University of Chicago Press, is available to purchase on Amazon.

Dr. Daniel J. Smith the Director of the Political Economy Research Institute and Associate Professor of Economics in the Jones College of Business at Middle Tennessee State University. Dr. Smith was previously the Associate Director of the Manuel H. Johnson Center for Political Economy and the BB&T Professor of Economic Freedom at Troy University. Daniel received his Ph.D. in economics from George Mason University. His academic research and policy work uses Austrian and public choice economics to analyze private and public governance institutions. His research is published in academics journals such, such as Public Choice, Economics of Governance, and the Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, and in chapters in books published by Oxford University Press, Routledge, and Wiley-Blackwell. Dr. Smith has been interviewed over 140 times on radio and television outlets across the nation and has published over 50 op-eds in newspapers, including in The Wall Street Journal, Investor’s Business Daily, CNBC.com, The Detroit News,The Jefferson City News Tribune, and AL.com.

Dr. Timothy G. Nash is the holder of the David E. Fry Endowed Chair in Free Market Economics at Northwood University. He received a B.B.A. from the university, an M.A. in Economics from Central Michigan University, and his doctorate from Wayne State University. Dr. Nash leads specialty programs, research and continuing and executive education programming for Northwood University system-wide. Nash is also the director of Northwood’s McNair Center for the Advancement of Free Enterprise and Entrepreneurship. Dr. Nash is an adjunct scholar with the Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland, an adjunct scholar with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in Washington, D.C., and is the former State Director of Economic Education for the clergy for the State of Michigan. Dr. Nash has co-authored four books including When We Are Free (with foreword by Dr. Milton Friedman) and In Defense of Capitalism (co-authored with Dr. Richard M. Ebeling, and Dr. Keith A. Pretty). Nash and his colleagues have conducted research and consulting for a number of Fortune 500 companies and their organizations including GM/UAW/PEL, the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA), the Motor & Equipment Manufacturers Association (MEMA), the Auto Care Association, the Michigan Chamber of Commerce Foundation, Chrysler, and Dow Corning Corporation. Nash is responsible for researching and publishing the Northwood University Monthly Economic Outlook, Auto Care Association’s monthly industry indicator’s report and its monthly Business Confidence Index.He is a frequent guest on Michigan-based ABC, NBC and CBS television stations, Michigan Talk Radio, and the Paul W. Smith and Frank Beckman Shows on WJR Radio. His writing and interviews have appeared in publications as diverse as The Detroit News, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Automotive News, Aftermarket Business, Aftermarket News, The New Jersey Star Ledger, USA Today, the Chicago Tribune, CNBC, Yahoo Finance, Wall Street Journal/MarketWatch, Harvard University’s Better, Faster, Cheaper and The International Review of Economics.

Harry C. Veryser was the director of graduate studies in economics at the University of Detroit Mercy from 2007-2012. In 2009, Prof. Veryser was appointed Treasurer at Thomas More College in New Hampshire.

He was the chairman of the Board of Directors of Stampings Inc., a light manufacturing concern in Fraser, Michigan with a division in Harlingen, Texas, from 1987 until its merger with Spring Engineering in 2005. In addition, he served as chairman of the economics and finance department at Walsh College for twenty years retiring in 2007 with the rank of Distinguished Professor. Mr. Veryser has served on the faculties of Northwood University, St. Mary’s College-Orchard Lake, Hillsdale College, Ave Maria College, Thomas More College of Liberal Arts, Rochester College and the University of Detroit. At which he taught courses in economics, history, ethics and philosophy. He received his undergraduate degree in Philosophy and Economics and two Master of Arts degrees in Economics and Religious Studies from the University of Detroit. He held the rank of Associate Professor of Economics and Finance at Walsh College.

His articles have appeared in The Detroit News, The Intercollegiate Review and The University Bookman. He is the author of Our Economic Crisis: Sources and Solutions. His latest book, It Did Not Have to Be This Way: How the Principles of Austrian Economics lead to Peace and Prosperity, has been published by ISI books in 2012.

Cato Institute Senior Fellow Michael Tanner heads research into a variety of domestic policies, with an emphasis on poverty and social welfare policy, health care, and Social Security and entitlement reform. His most recent book is The Inclusive Economy: How to Bring Wealth to America’s Poor, a comprehensive look at the ways government contributes to poverty in the United States. Based on the ideas explored in that book, he has recently founded The Project on Poverty and Inequality in California to develop innovative solutions to poverty in California, which is widely seen as a model for building bipartisan consensus around innovative ways to reform government‐imposed barriers to economic participation by the poor and marginalized groups.

Tanner is also the author of numerous other books on public policy, including Going for Broke: Deficits, Debt, and the Entitlement Crisis, Leviathan on the Right: How Big‐Government Conservatism Brought Down the Republican Revolution, Healthy Competition: What’s Holding Back Health Care and How to Free It, The Poverty of Welfare: Helping Others in Civil Society, and A New Deal for Social Security. He also contributed a chapter on libertarian solutions for poverty to libertarianism.org’s Visions of Liberty.

Jason Hayes is the director of Environmental Policy for the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Located in Midland, Michigan, and founded in 1987, the Mackinac Center is a nonpartisan research and educational institute that is dedicated to advancing liberty and opportunity for all people through research and education.

The Environmental Policy Initiative at the Mackinac Center focuses on improving the lives of Michigan’s residents by first working to understand Michigan’s unique natural features, and then promoting policies that will balance the state’s environmental health and economic vigor.

Jason has spent almost three decades studying and working in environmental and energy policy. He worked as a backcountry ranger in British Columbia’s provincial parks, as a forester in British Columbia’s boreal forest, and researched National Parks management and grizzly bear biology with the Fraser Institute in Calgary, Alberta. He spent over a decade researching and communicating energy and environmental policy with the Canadian and American energy industry. In July 2016, Jason moved to the Mackinac Center to head up its Environmental Policy Initiative.

Jason holds a Master of Environmental Design (Environmental Science) degree from the University of Calgary, a Bachelor of Science in Natural Resource Conservation from the University of British Columbia and a Technical Diploma in Renewable Resource Management from Selkirk College.

Jason also serves as an adjunct faculty member at Northwood University, teaching Environmental Science, and as a policy advisor to the Heartland Institute on issues of energy and environmental policy.

The aftermarket looks to Managing Partner Derek Kaufman when it wants to know “what’s next.” An engineer by education and passion, he started his automotive career as a manufacturing process engineer with the Chevrolet Division of General Motors after his graduation from General Motors Institute.

His career includes executive positions with Euclid Trucks, Freightliner and Penske Corporation and entrepreneurship in the formation of his own company. As president of Penske Corporation’s Diesel Technology Company (DTC), Derek led the DTC team to produce electronically controlled fuel injection for both Detroit Diesel and EMD locomotives in the USA and form a global partnership with Robert Bosch Corporation to sell fuel systems to major European truck manufacturers.

Derek also served the Penske organization as Senior Vice President of Sales, Marketing and Customer Support for Hino Trucks and VP Administration of Penske’s smartUSA smart car distribution organization. Derek formed his C3 Network company in Grand Rapids, MI to help clients launch new products in the trucking industry and also served as CEO of Mission Motors Company, a producer of power electronics components for the automotive, powersports, commercial transportation and off-highway equipment markets.

Derek serves on the boards of several transportation related companies and speaks regularly on emerging technology in the automotive and commercial vehicle markets.

George Leef is director of editorial content for the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal. He holds a bachelor of arts degree from Carroll College (Waukesha, WI) and a juris doctor from Duke University School of Law. He was a vice president of the John Locke Foundation until 2003.

Prior to joining the Locke Foundation, Leef was president of Patrick Henry Associates, a consulting firm in Michigan dedicated to assisting others in advocating free markets, minimal government, private property, and individual rights. Previously, Leef was on the faculty of Northwood University in Midland, Michigan, where he taught courses in economics, business law, and logic. He has also worked as a policy adviser in the Michigan Senate.

A regular columnist for Forbes.com, Leef was book review editor of The Freeman, published by the Foundation for Economic Education, from 1996 to 2012. He has published numerous articles in The Freeman, Reason, The Free Market, Cato Journal, The Detroit News, Independent Review, and Regulation. He writes regularly for the National Review’s The Corner blog and for SeethruEdu.com.