• I AM ON LEAVE AT PRESENT SO NO OFFICE HOURS

About Me

I am a macroeconomist who teaches both undergraduate and graduate level macroeconomics and applied econometrics. I have also taught at the London School of Economics (MSc Macroeconomics and Undergraduate European Economics), New York University (Undergraduate Money and Banking) and the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business (Executive MBA Macroeconomics). I have been awarded numerous teaching prizes from these institutions and I am currently an advisory board member for the UK Higher Education Academy's Economics Network - a body which promotes the more effective teaching of economics in the profession.

I have worked for three different central banks (Bank of England, ECB, and Central Bank of Ireland). I continued to be employed by the Bank of England as a consultant until March 2010 carrying out research and policy work. I have been interviewed and quoted by the media (for example, The Washington Post and BBC World Service) on issues concerning monetary policy, financial regulation and the sovereign debt crisis.

My graduate training (PhD, MRes, MSc) was all in macroeconomics from the London School of Economics, and my undergraduate (BA) is from Trinity College Dublin.

My teaching philosophy is that economics is not a set of rules and laws that necessarily hold. Instead it is a way of thinking and a set of analytical tools which, once understood, allow the user to address and explain any topic. Given my background in macroeconomic policymaking, I tend to emphasise the practical application of these tools as much, if not more, than the theoretical elements. I believe that students should earn their grades through hard work and developing an understanding; this stands in contrast to the views of many students nowadays! An article called "Making The Grade" by Kurt Wiesenfeld appeared in Newsweek magazine on Jun 17, 1996 and captures some of this sentiment (a link to the article is here).

My CV is available here.

Research

My main areas of interest are:

• macroeconomics of business cycles
• monetary economics
• inventories
• applied econometrics

Details of publications and working papers can be found on my Research Interests page

Teaching

EC108 Macroeconomics 1

EC230 Money and Banking

EC340 Topics in Applied Economics

Miscellaneous

My views on research and teaching and the challenges of managing both in a research university - TEDxWarwick Talk, March 2011

An interesting visit of Nobel Prize winning physicist Carl Wieman to Dublin Institute of Technology - proof that good research and good teaching are not mutually exclusive. You can even view his lecture as a video. And yes, that Dr McMahon in the pictures is my father! http://www.dit.ie/news/archive2009/carlwiemanvisittodit/

MAILING ADDRESS:

Department of Economics

University of Warwick

Coventry

CV4 7AL

United Kingdom