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Benjamin Powell is Senior Fellow at the Independent Institute, Director of the Free Market Institute at Texas Tech University, and former President of the Association of Private Enterprise Education. Dr. Powell received his Ph.D. in economics from George Mason University and his Bachelor of Science degree in Finance and Economics from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell. He has been Associate Professor of Economics at Suffolk University, Assistant Professor of Economics at San Jose State University, a Fellow with the Mercatus Center's Global Prosperity Initiative, and a Visiting Research Fellow with the American Institute for Economic Research.

Dr. Powell is the author of more than 50 scholarly studies and the editor of the books, The Economics of Immigration: Market-Based Approaches, Social Science, and Public Policy; Housing America: Building Out of a Crisis (with Randall Holcombe); and Making Poor Nations Rich: Entrepreneurship and the Process of Economic Development. He has contributed to numerous volumes, and his scholarly research has been published in such journals as Public Choice, Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, Journal of Private Enterprise, Eastern Economic Journal, Comparative Economic Studies, Human Rights Quarterly, Journal of Labor Research, Cato Journal, Florida State University Law Review, Review of Austrian Economics and Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics..

Dr. Powell’s popular articles have appeared in numerous newspapers, magazines, and web sites, including the Investors Business Daily, Washington Post, FoxNews.com, Charlotte Observer, Orange County Register, San Diego Union Tribune, Boston Herald, and many city business journals. He has appeared on shows such as “The Situation with Tucker Carlson” on MSNBC, CNN’s “Lou Dobbs Tonight,” and Fox Business Channel's "Freedom Watch with Judge Napolitano," and he has debated economic issues on numerous radios shows. His academic research findings have been reported in the Wall Street Journal, Investors Business Daily and over one hundred regional papers such as the San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury News, and Miami Herald.