Members in the News: November 3, 2025

 Zach Rutledge, Michigan State University

• “New Coalition Hopes to Elevate Stories of Farmers in the Ag Labor Crisis”
  By: The Packer – October 27, 2025
• “Federal Migrant Worker Program Proves Fickle, Agriculture Workers and Employers Want Change”
  By: Kansas Reflector – October 27, 2025

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Alexis Villacis, The Ohio State University

• “Chocolate Crunch Sends Halloween Candy Prices Soaring”
  By: NBC News – October 29, 2025
• “Halloween Candy Prices Have Nearly Doubled in Five Years As Sticker Shock Continues to Hit America”
  By: The Independent – October 29, 2025
• “Halloween Candy Prices Rising, Spooked By Trump’s Tariffs and Climate Change”
  By: The Guardian – October 30, 2025
• “Scary Prices: Cost of Halloween Chocolate on the Rise”
  By: Morning Ag Clips – October 2, 2025

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David Ortega, Michigan State University

• “Fact Check: Grocery Prices Are Up, Not ‘Way Down’ as Trump Claimed”
  By: CNN  - October 24, 2025
• “Wholesale Turkey Prices Soar Ahead of Thanksgiving”
  By: CBS News – October 22, 2025
• “Turkey Prices Soar Before Thanksgiving”
  By: Newsweek – October 24, 2025

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Amitrajeet Batabyal, Rochester Institute of Technology

• “Can We Produce Aviation Fuel Sustainably to Meet the Rise in Air Travel?”
  By: Rochester Business Journal - October 13, 2025
• “Why the ‘One Nation One Ration Card’ Scheme Still Falls Short in Practice”
  By: Basis Point – November 1, 2025

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Sandro Steinbach, North Dakota State University

“China’s Trade-War Playbook Keeps U.S. Soybeans Sidelined”

By: Ag Web – October 27, 2025

“China’s refusal to buy U.S. soybeans this fall is less about economics and more about politics. China is making a calculated move to limit its dependence on the United States. If Chinese leaders see Washington as a strategic threat, they have the resources to pay a little more for Brazilian soybeans or draw down state reserves. It’s about control and national leverage, not about getting the cheapest beans.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Ag Web

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Andrew Muhammad, University of Tennessee

Trump’s Tariffs Have U.S. Soybean Farmers Looking for Buyers”

By: Sentient Media – October 20, 2025

“Even if you find yourself to be a farmer who sells to a biodiesel plant, you’re still going to suffer from the depressed prices from the extra soybeans lingering on the domestic market. Everybody’s negatively affected.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Sentient Media

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William Ridley, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

“U.S. Ag Trade Deficit Widens As Exports Decline and Imports Rise”

By: Brownfield Ag News – October 20, 2025

“Exports have largely been chugging along at the same levels for quite a while now. This year, however, exports have really nosedived. All of that’s driven by the current situation with China in the trade war. So, what was kind of a troubling situation has turned into a really serious, dire situation.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Brownfield Ag News

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Jeff Luckstead, Washington State University

“Harvest at a Crossroads: How immigration is affecting the 2025 harvest in the Pacific Northwest”

By: Yakima Herald – October 21, 2025

“Reducing the wage could affect whether workers sign H-2A agreements. He also said that farmers have been looking for wage relief as agricultural wages have increased. H-2A wage rates have been growing around 20% a year on average. So this could provide some relief for the farmers but could have some longer run effects on supply issues.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Yakima Herald

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Yizao Liu, Pennsylvania State University

“How Is Online Grocery Shopping Changing Our Eating Habits? Insights from Penn State University”

By: Newz9 – October 20, 2025

“Shopping has changed significantly. Many people, regardless of income or location, are now buying groceries with just a few clicks. The aim is to find out how this change impacts our eating habits. Grocery shopping plays a key role in our health and daily choices, so understanding online shopping’s effects is crucial.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Newz9

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Christopher Bastian, University of Wyoming
Glynn Tonsor, Kansas State University

“Wyoming Ranchers Call For Help as Trump Turns to Argentine Beef Imports”

By: Gillette News Record – October 24, 2025

“In 2024, the U.S. consumed 27.8 billion pounds of beef. Relative to this figure, the increase, even up to 100,000 metric tons, is unlikely to cause beef prices to drop by dollars per pound. At the retail and cattle level ... it will have some impact, but it’s unlikely to be a big impact.”

“The likelihood of importing enough additional pounds of beef from Argentina to impact the market in a sizable way is pretty low. Argentine beef currently accounts for only about 2% of total U.S. beef imports.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Gillette News Record

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Grant Gardner, University of Kentucky

“Has the Trade War Affected Bourbon Prices?”

By: Byteseu – October 25, 2025

“A bottle of bourbon can cost anywhere from between $20 to over $100 for more premium products. We are seeing higher supply, but we haven’t seen large drops in prices. That’s because alcohol is a perishable good, which means you can put it in storage and release it at a slower pace, keeping prices at their current levels. I think your long-term hope is that you can just hold onto that product…and you can continue to sell it at a higher price later on. But we’re not seeing prices move up as much as they used to as a result.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Byteseu

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Becca Jablonski, Cornell University

“Trump’s Argentina Beef Deal Angers America’s Struggling Farmers: ‘You’re Selling Us Out’”

By: CNN – October 23, 2025

“The price increase is fueled by multiple factors. Historically the livestock sector barely makes money, but is having a rare positive year, which allows farmers to pay down debts they accrued during unprofitable years.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: CNN

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Andrew Hultgren, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

“Why Your Beef, Bananas and Coffee Beans Have Gotten So Expensive”

By: CBS News – October 27, 2025

“Global prices for bananas and coffee will continue to be sensitive to extreme heat or drought conditions, especially because the products are cultivated in a relatively small number of regions around the world. These types of price sensitivities will look like inflation to the average consumer.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: CBS News

Gund Institute for Environment Funded PhD Opportunities

The Gund Institute for Environment at the University of Vermont (UVM) seeks exceptional PhD applicants to conduct interdisciplinary research on global environmental challenges beginning in fall 2026. Applications are due Jan. 6, 2026.

The Gund Institute is a research center dedicated to understanding and tackling the world’s most critical environmental challenges, where 300 faculty, global affiliates, postdocs, and graduate students collaborate widely to understand interactions among ecological, social, and economic systems.

Driven by the belief that research should inspire action, we explore environmental issues at the interface of five pressing research themes—climate solutions, health and well-being, sustainable agriculture, resilient communities, and equity and justice—in partnership with government, industry, and broader society.

Students will receive up to four years of funding, including an annual stipend of $37,000, plus tuition. All students are eligible for health insurance and additional funds for conference travel and research costs. These assistantships are for individuals who have not yet started their PhDs.

For more details and application instructions, please see this webpage.

Students who are interested in the Leadership for the Ecozoic (L4E) initiative are encouraged to apply to both the Gund and L4E.

Questions? Please contact: bailey.rowland@uvm.edu

Member Blog: David Zilberman

“If Walls Could Speak” by Moshe Safdie -Architecture and Lessons for Economics

Moshe Safdie is a master builder, a world leading architect who aims to address people’s social problems by designing buildings. I first met Moshe Safdie when we were recipients of the Wolf Prize. Safdie radiated the quiet authority of someone whose work speaks for itself, yet he was generous with his time and insights. He guided the recipients and their families through one of his signature creations in Jerusalem: the Mamilla development, a project that connects the two halves of the city, adjacent to the Old City walls. Walking beside him, I sensed that this was not just another commercial development but a meditation on coexistence. Here was architecture as diplomacy: ancient stone blended with modern design, sacred and secular, Jewish and Arab, commerce and spirituality. Years later, reading his memoir If Walls Could Speak: My Life in Architecture (Safdie 2022), I relived that moment. The book is captivating not only as a personal journey but as a profound philosophical statement. It is also, for me as an economist, a reminder that one understands one’s own discipline more fully by studying the leaders of others.

A Life in Architecture

Safdie’s life story reads like a modern epic. Born in Haifa in 1938 to a Sephardic family of Syrian descent, he grew up in a society that both offered opportunity and imposed barriers. His family was relatively affluent, but as Sephardim they were not fully accepted into the Ashkenazi-dominated elite of early Israel. This tension between belonging and exclusion shaped his worldview, giving him both resilience and empathy. At 15, Safdie moved to Montreal. His brilliance soon found expression in architecture, and at 29 he produced his breakthrough: Habitat 67, the modular housing project designed for the Montreal Expo. Its concrete blocks stacked like Lego created a new model of urban living. Safdie recalls: “I had been given an impossible task, with impossible constraints. Yet it was precisely these constraints that unleashed invention” (Safdie, 2022, p. 74). From that moment, his career became global. He designed airports in Canada, museums in Arkansas, housing in Singapore, bridges in India. Each project was different, but each bore his signature: an insistence that architecture must serve humanity. “Buildings are not sculptures,” he writes. “They must work, they must breathe, they must dignify” (p. 128)

My encounters with Safdie gave the book added resonance. Visiting his Arkansas museum, I was struck by how the building seemed to grow out of the landscape, uniting art and nature. Walking with him through Mamilla, I saw firsthand how he reconciled contradictions—sacred and secular, old and new, divided yet connected.

Reading his memoir was like revisiting those moments. The pages felt personal, a continuation of conversations begun years ago. His voice in print matched the man I knew passionate, reflective, unpretentious.

The Glamour and the Gravity

Safdie’s book is also candid about the glamour of being a world-famous architect. He mingled with the rich and powerful, from kings to philanthropists. He designed iconic landmarks that became part of national identity. Unlike economists, who rarely make headlines, architects become celebrities, shaping skylines and cultures. One of the most touching stories in the book is his relationship with Yitzhak Rabin. Safdie admired Rabin’s courage in pursuing peace. He recalls their conversations with warmth, describing him as a man of both humility and vision. The assassination of Rabin was a personal and professional wound. Safdie was asked to design Rabin’s grave, and he did so with profound simplicity: “I wanted his resting place to echo the man himself— austere, modest, yet enduring” (p. 283). Reading this was painful for me as well. Like Safdie, I was devastated by Rabin’s death. It was not only the loss of a leader but the loss of possibility. The opportunities for peace that evaporated with his death continue to haunt the Middle East. Safdie’s grave design stands as both tribute and lament: a reminder of what was, and what might have been.

The Philosophical Core and Lessons for Economists

What elevates If Walls Could Speak above a standard memoir, is its philosophical depth. Safdie argues that architecture is not just about structures, but about human experience. He rejects both pure functionalism and pure spectacle. Instead, he insists on a balance between utility and beauty. “The true test of a building,” he notes, “is not whether it dazzles at its opening but whether, fifty years later, it still makes life better for those who inhabit it” (p. 201). This struck me as an economist. Our discipline, too, is about designing systems that last. We construct policies, markets, and supply chains that must endure beyond the immediate. Safdie’s emphasis on longevity—on buildings that grow into their surroundings—is a lesson for us. An economic model or institution must likewise be judged not by its immediate efficiency but by its resilience and humanity over time. Safdie is also deeply spiritual, though not religious. He speaks of architecture as a calling, a devotion to humanity rather than to any deity. “I build,” he writes, “not to serve God but to serve humanity. If there is holiness in what I do, it lies in the dignity it confers” (p. 302). Economists, reading this, might ask themselves: are our equations merely technical, or do they also confer dignity?

Reading Safdie made me reflect on several lessons for my own field: 

Constraints as Catalysts – Habitat 67 was born from impossibility. “The more they told me it could not be done, the more I knew I had to try” (p. 66). For economists, this is a reminder that scarcity and limitation are not only problems but opportunities for innovation. Climate change, drought, or resource limits can drive creativity rather than despair.

Utility beyond material needs – Safdie insists that architecture must nurture the spirit. “A home must be more than walls and a roof; it must allow its inhabitants to feel they belong” (p. 119). Economists, likewise, must see welfare as more than consumption. Belonging, fairness, and identity are part of human well-being.

Beauty as Necessity – Safdie defends beauty not as luxury but as a human need. “To build without beauty is to diminish those who live within” (p. 147). In economics, the analogy is clear: policies that maximize efficiency while eroding dignity or justice are incomplete.

Design as Diplomacy is Jerusalem projects embody architecture as a peace-making force. “Every stone laid here is also a statement about who belongs. I wanted to build in a way that said: we all belong” (p. 214). Economists, too, must treat trade, migration, and development as not merely technical but relational, requiring trust and mutual recognition.

Heterogeneity and Fit – Perhaps the most powerful lesson for economics is Safdie’s insistence that architecture must fit its context. No single design works everywhere. A museum in Arkansas cannot be a replica of one in Singapore; a housing complex in Jerusalem must respond to different cultural and historical realities than one in Montreal. “Every place demands its own solution, drawn from its landscape, its culture, its people” (p. 189).

This resonates strongly with my own research. Markets, technologies, and institutions do not behave uniformly across regions or populations. Adoption patterns differ, preferences vary, and constraints evolve in distinct ways. Just as architects study the terrain and culture before sketching a line, economists must understand local context before designing a policy. The “one-size-fits-all” approach fails because it ignores heterogeneity—the diversity of resources, incentives, and human behaviors that define our world.

Safdie’s architecture teaches that “fit” is not “compromise”—it is excellence shaped by empathy. Economists, too, must embrace diversity and adaptation as the essence of good design. Context is not noise; it is the condition for meaningful solutions

Economics Through Architecture

The greatest gift of this book, for me, was how it illuminated my own discipline. Economists often pride themselves on abstraction, reducing life to equations. Safdie refuses reduction. He insists on the messy fullness of human life. His architecture is not only about efficiency but about meaning. Economics should be the same. Our task is not simply to allocate resources but to design systems that uplift. Safdie’s insistence that “Every building makes a statement about who we are and what we value” (p. 91) could be translated directly into economics: every policy, every market, every trade-off expresses values. The question is whether those values ennoble or diminish us.

Conclusion

If Walls Could Speak is more than a memoir. It is a philosophical reflection, a moral testament, and a design manifesto. It shows us a boy from Haifa who became a global architect, rubbing shoulders with presidents and designing landmarks that endure. It also shows us a man of humility, who believes architecture is ultimately about humanity. It was written by an architect, but it provides lessons for all disciplines. 

For economists, this book is invaluable. It reveals our discipline through another lens. Like architects, we are designers, working under constraints. Like them, we must aspire not only to functionality but to dignity, not only to growth but to belonging. And like them, we must remember that one size does not fit all: heterogeneity, context, and fit are not obstacles to design—they are its essence. Safdie’s friendship with Rabin, and the grave he designed, remind us of the opportunities lost when peace is deferred. His buildings remind us that beauty is not optional. And his philosophy reminds us that walls do speak—and when they do, they can tell stories of fit, dignity, and coexistence.

References

• Safdie, Moshe. If Walls Could Speak: My Life in Architecture. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2022.
• Simon, Herbert A. The Sciences of the Artificial. 3rd ed. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996.

 

Members in the News: October 27, 2025

 Zach Rutledge, Michigan State University

• “Immigration Turmoil Sparks Workforce Worries For Many Michigan Industries”
  By: Crain’s Detroit Business – October 23, 2025
• “U.S. Farmers Face Labor Crisis, Warn of Supply Collapse Without Policy Reform”
  By: Oklahoma Farm Report – October 24, 2025
• “New Farmer Coalition Aims to Raise Awareness About Labor Shortages Facing U.S. Agricultural Sector”
  By: KJZZ - October 24, 2025

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Jada Thompson, University of Arkansas
David Ortega, Michigan State University

“Bird Flu Roars Back: What It Means for Thanksgiving”

By: Think Global Health – October 24, 2025

“All of these imports arrived prior to August 2025, when U.S. flocks showed signs of recovery. The shipments wither next to the size of American production—but they may have eased prices in port cities and border states.”

 "We're in a better spot in terms of preparation and biosecurity than we were at the beginning of the outbreak.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Think Global Health

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David Ortega, Michigan State University

• “Fact Check: Grocery Prices Are Up, Not ‘Way Down’ as Trump Claimed”
  By: CNN  - October 24, 2025
• “Wholesale Turkey Prices Soar Ahead of Thanksgiving”
  By: CBS News – October 22, 2025
• “Turkey Prices Soar Before Thanksgiving”
  By: Newsweek – October 24, 2025

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Amitrajeet Batabyal, Rochester Institute of Technology

“Are Tariffs Good or Bad?”

By: Bottom Line Inc – October 23, 2025

“Tariffs made big headlines this year. Until recently, tariffs were typically an arcane international trade issue discussed mostly by economists. But tariffs have been thrust into the mainstream due to their aggressive use by the Trump administration. Whatever your feelings about tariffs, there’s no question that they’re currently playing a critical role in the US and global economy.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Bottom Line Inc

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Carson Reeling, Purdue University

“Can Pennsylvania Dairies Profit From Carbon Markets?”

By: Lancaster Farming – May 26, 2025

“The challenge with those is we have absolutely no idea how much carbon is actually being sequestered in the soil. We can simulate that, but it’s not nearly as reliable as a dairy farmer who said, ‘Hey, I’ve got this new methane digester.’”

(Continued...)
Read more on: Lancaster Farming

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Valerie Kilders, Purdue University

• “Eggs Are President Now”
  By: The Washington Post – March 27, 2025
• “These Fast Food Restaurants Increased Their Prices the Most Last Year”
  By: CNET – July 2, 2025
• “Decoding Public Sentiment: How Web-Scraped Data Shapes Poultry Market Decisions”
  By: Feedstuffs – April 11, 2025

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Gregory Ibendahl, Kansas State University

“Input Costs Putting a Big Bite on Farmers’ Bottom Line”

By: High Plains Journal – October 17, 2025

“Inflation over the past couple of years has added to input costs, too. A couple of stressor points of inflation, fuel and interest costs, have modestly declined in the past year. Fertilizer is the second biggest expense outside of machinery expenses, and machinery costs have also been impacted by inflation, and tariffs have driven up the cost for steel needed to make equipment.”

(Continued...)
Read more on: High Plains Journal