Economics Department Welcomes New Assistant Professor

Hornstein received her bachelor’s degree in Chinese language and history; her master’s degree in economics and international business from New York University Stern School of Business; and her Ph.D in economics and international business from the New York University Stern School of Business.

Her dissertation examined the capital budgeting decisions of multinational enterprises. She examined U.S. firms in the 1990s to determine if effective capital budgeting is associated with where a firm invests.

“I found that effective capital budgeting is strongly and significantly associated with multinationality after controlling for characteristics of the countries where a firm invests,” she says.

At Wesleyan, Hornstein is interested in exploring the relationship between corporate performance and corporate structure.

“In my work so far I’ve taken a narrow approach by examining the relationship between the efficacy of corporate capital budgeting decisions and various corporate characteristics, particularly multinationality,” she says.

Hornstein says she’d like to extend this work in several dimensions to ascertain the relationship between corporate capital budgeting and CEO turnover, corporate governance, and the use of patents to protect proprietary firm-specific knowledge.

Hornstein has held several economics-related positions outside of academia. In 1994, she worked in Hong Kong for a boutique management consultancy, advising a multinational clientele on issues pertaining to investing in China. In 1996, she joined HongKong and Shanghai Banking Corporation’s China research group, covering China’s foreign investment and foreign trade for the group’s research publications and the bank’s clients. In 1998, Hornstein assumed full coverage for HSBC of the ASEAN economies (Indonesia, Malyasia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam).

Since her days as an undergrad at Bryn Mawr, Hornstein’s had a strong interest in the liberal arts environment.

“I’ve always believed strongly in the importance of a liberal arts undergraduate education and I’m thrilled to join a faculty that places such a strong emphasis on both research and teaching,” she says. “It is really exciting to have such an accomplished set of colleagues, and brilliant students to teach.”

Hornstein will teach Corporate Finance in the fall, Investment Finance in the spring and Quantitative Methods in Economics both semesters.