Phone: 778.782.5035
Fax: 778.782.5288
email: kesselman(at)sfu(dot)ca
Office: Harbour Centre 3263
Biography:
Jonathan R. Kesselman joined Simon Fraser University’s
Public Policy Program in 2004, where he is a professor
and holds the Canada Research Chair in Public
Finance. From 1972 to 2003 he was a professor
of economics at the University of British Columbia,
and from 1992 to 2003 he served as director of
the UBC Centre for Research on Economic and Social
Policy. He was director and principal invesitgator
of the SSHRC/MCRI project on "Equality/Security/Community."
He has a B.A. (Hon.) from Oberlin College and
a Ph.D. from M.I.T.
Professor Kesselman is a frequent commentator
on issues of public finance, taxation, and economic
policy. He has written widely on topics in taxation,
income security, employment policy, and social
insurance finance, including monographs on Financing
Canadian Unemployment Insurance (1983), Rate Structure
and Personal Taxation: Flat Rate or Dual Rate?
(1990); General Payroll Taxes: Economics, Politics,
and Design (1997); a C.D. Howe Institute study,
A New Option for Retirement Savings: Tax-Prepaid
Savings Plans (2001); a study for the Institute
for Research on Public Policy, Tax Design for
a Northern Tiger (2004), and a co-edited volume
for UBC press, Dimensions of Inequality in Canada
(2006). His research also appears in numerous
articles in scholarly journals.
Professor Kesselman’s research has been
recognized by the Reserve Bank of Australia’s
Professorial Fellowship in Economic Policy (1985),
the Doug Purvis Memorial Prize for Canadian economic
policy research (1998 and 2007), and the Canadian
Tax Foundation’s Douglas J. Sherbaniuk Distinguished
Research Award (2002). He is a Research Fellow
with the C.D. Howe Institute and serves on the
editorial boards of Canadian Public Policy and
the Canadian Tax Journal.
His research interests in recent years include
the economics of tax avoidance and evasion, reform
of the GST, finance of post-secondary education,
the National Child Benefit, flat taxes, personal
and business tax reform, First Nations taxation,
federal and provincial payroll taxes, BC fiscal
and taxation policies, the distributional impacts
of taxes, the “brain drain,” mandatory
retirement, income splitting and the basic income
guarantee.
