Sezer Alcan
Graduate Research Assistant
(Turkey)
EMAIL

Sezer Alcan is a first year doctoral student at the Economics department, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University. Before enrolling in the doctoral program in Economics she was working for Undersecretariat of Turkish Treasury where she was working on financial programming and budgeting of state owned companies in transport and communication sector. Her research interests are Government Borrowing, Government Budgeting, and International Finance.

Armindo Banze
Graduate Research Assistant
(Mozambique)
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Armindo Banze holds a B.A. in economics from the University of the District of Columbia , and is a second-year Master's student in economics at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies. Originally from Mozambique, Armindo spent 6 years working for the United Nations Development Programme as a field worker, for post-conflict reintegration and grassroots economic development in Southern Africa and Southeast Asia. In addition, he served as a district electoral officer during the first presidential election in East Timor , and was a team-member of the Mozambique 's national census data collection. Armindo's interest in economics stems from growing up through a war in Mozambique , his involvement in post war reconstruction, and promoting income generation and women's empowerment in rural communities. Armindo has earned a certificate in community development and business management. His research interest includes development economics and public finance.

Lori Jones
Graduate Research Assistant
(USA)
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Lori Jones began the M.P.A. program in the spring of 2008. In May 2003 she earned a Bachelor’s of Interdisciplinary Studies from Georgia State in Language Studies with a concentration in Sociolinguistics and a minor in Spanish.
During her time as an undergraduate student she studied in Guadalajara Mexico for six months. Since that time she has taught English as a Second Language to adults in the metro Atlanta area and most recently was the International Admissions Coordinator at Georgia State University assisting students in obtaining student visas.

Benjamin Miller
Graduate Research Assistant
(USA)
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Benjamin Miller is a fourth year doctoral student in Economics in the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University. He completed his undergraduate studies in International Economics and Spanish at the University of Florida (2004). As a graduate research assistant in the International Studies Program he has done work on public finance issues in several developing and transition economies. In addition to public finance, his research interests include personnel economics and labor economics. Currently he is on the process of finishing his dissertation, where he is investigating the demand for human resource management practices in firms.

Abdullah Khan
Graduate Research Assistant
(Bangladesh)
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Abdullah Khan is a PhD student in the Department of Economics at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University. He holds an MBA degree from Western Kentucky University and an MA in economics degree from Georgia State University. In the past, he has worked for the Ministry of Planning and Bangladesh Public Administration Training Center of Government of Bangladesh. He has also worked for United Nations' Department of Economic and Social Affairs at UN Secretariat, and was awarded with commonwealth fellowship and Hubert Humphrey Fellowship. He has visited Netherlands, France, Germany, Barbados and several states of USA in connection with professional training and personal interests.

Cliff Muga
Graduate Research Assistant
(Tanzania)
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Cliff Muga, from Tanzania, is a finalist in M.A Economics at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University. He is an employee of the Ministry of Finance, Government Budget Unit (Tanzania). He has worked with Tanzania Harbors Authority in the Finance Department (Dar Es Salaam Port). He has experience in Budget Formulation, Policy Analysis, Project Coordination, Financial, Auditing, and Management Accounting. His interest is in economic policy and applied macroeconomics.

Riatu Qibthiyyah
Graduate Research Assistant
(Indonesia)
EMAIL

Riatu M. Qibthiyyah is currently enrolled as a student of Doctoral Program in Economics at Georgia State University. She recently completed her Masters in Economics as part of the USAID-sponsored Indonesian Master Program in Spring 2002. Before studying in U.S, she worked at LPEM-FEUI (Institute for Economics and Social Research-Faculty of Economics) at University of Indonesia in Jakarta. For the past one and a half year, she was involved in several LPEM research projects concerning poverty and fiscal decentralization issues.

Safia Shabbir is a Fulbright scholar, holding an M.A economics degree from Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, Pakistan. She is a first year doctoral student in economics at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies. Prior to joining the doctoral program, she was working as an economic analyst in the research department of the Central Bank of Pakistan. Her responsibilities included tracking and writing reviews on fiscal developments of Pakistan's economy, in the areas of privatization process, tax policy and administration reforms, fiscal federalism, and performance of public sector enterprise for the Central Bank's annual and quarterly reports. In addition, she has taught various courses in economics at Mamoona Postgraduate College and Govt. Degree College, Multan, Pakistan for three years. She also served as a visiting instructor at the Directorate of Customs, Training & Research in Karachi- Pakistan for almost two years.  Her research interests include public finance and fiscal policy.  

Renata Simatupang, an Indonesian national, holds a Master of Economics degree from Georgia State University (2003), as a participant of the Indonesian Master Program funded by USAID. She is enrolled in the Doctoral program in Economics, at Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University. Renata has been graduate student assistant for the International Studies Program since 2003 and was involved in various ISP projects such as USAID funded Corruption Study and the DANIDA funded Tanzania Local Government Financing Project. Currently she is working on her dissertation on decentralization in Indonesia. Her primary research interests are Fiscal decentralization, Public expenditure and budgeting, and Urban economics in developing countries.

Harold Vasquez Ruiz
Graduate Research Assistant
(Dominican Republic)
EMAIL

Harold is originally from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. After graduating with a B.A. in Economics at the Technological Institute of Santo Domingo (INTEC), he pursued a Master Degree in Finance at Carlos III University, Madrid, Spain (2002). Then, Harold returned to the Dom. Rep. to work as an economist at the Research Department at the Central Bank of Dominican Republic (2002-2005), and at the same time he was lecturer of Introductory Economics and Macroeconomics in the Economics Department of INTEC. During his time at the Central Bank, the Dominican economy experienced one of its major financial crises (2002-2004), which resulted in the establishment of a stand-by agreement with the IMF. Harold was working for the team in charge of pursuing the stabilization policies and negotiating the terms of the IMF agreement.

Harold came to AYSPS for his Master Degree in Economics (2005) and joined the Ph.D. program in 2007. In addition, during the last two years, he has been working as an intern at the Research Department at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. His research interests include international finance, macroeconomics, and taxation in developing economies.

Violeta Vulovic
Graduate Research Assistant
(Serbia)
EMAIL

Violeta Vulovic is currently enrolled as a third year student in the doctoral program in Economics. She holds an MA in Economics from Georgia State University, and B. Sc. in Economics from the University of Belgrade, Serbia. Prior to enrolling in the graduate program at GSU, from 2002 to 2005 she was employed as a fiscal analyst with the Ministry of Finance of Serbia, with major duties in Revenue Forecasting and Budget Memorandum Preparation, Tax Policy and Budget Execution Analysis, and correspondence with the IMF, World Bank and the European Commission. She participated in several trainings on Tax Policy and Revenue Forecasting, Financial Programming and Public Governance organized by OECD, IMF, Bocconi University, HM Treasury and ISP AYSPS. Violeta's research Interests include: international taxation, public policy analysis, fiscal decentralization, and sub-national governance.