'No such thing as a free lunch'

Raphael Bostic can't understand why people think economists are socially challenged. The Associate Professor at USC's School of Policy, Planning and Development and Director of the Casden Real Estate Economics Forecast within the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate began his career writing training materials for a Washington area computer consultant. Prior to joining USC, Bostic spent six years on the staff at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. During that time, he attained the rank of Senior Economist and received a Special Achievement Award in 2000 for his work supporting a congressionally mandated assessment of the Community Reinvestment Act. He also served as a special assistant to the assistant secretary of policy development and research at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Bostic has conducted extensive research on housing and housing finance, with a particular focus on minority homeownership and mortgage risk assessment. He is currently conducting research on the ways in which the Community Reinvestment Act has influenced the behavior of lenders and credit markets. Bostic's broad research interests include financial markets and institutions, with a particular focus on banks in community development, the role and effects of regulation in banking, housing and homeownership, discrimination issues, urban economic growth, wage and earnings profiles and policy analysis generally. Bostic teaches courses at USC in affordable housing development and public finance. Bostic received his bachelor's in psychology and economics from Harvard University in 1987 and his Ph.D. in economics from Stanford in 1995. Biggest misconception people have about economists: That they are all socially challenged. Favorite economist joke: I'm not a good jokester, so I shy away from these things. Your first real job: Writer of training materials for a Washington area computer consultant. Favorite economics quote: "There's no such thing as a free lunch." Magazines you read: Black Enterprise, Newsweek, Birder's World Most accurate forecast you've made: That the tech bubble would burst. Your least accurate forecast: I was two years off on when the tech bubble would burst. Biggest recurring economics problem or headache: Getting people to distinguish between equity and efficiency in discussion of perfect competition.