Morris Kleiner
Labor Policy Fellow

Morris M. Kleiner, PhD, is a labor policy fellow at the Archbridge Institute and one of the world’s leading labor economists. He is a professor at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. His work focuses on the role of institutions in labor markets and employment issues in enhancing productivity. He has published in the best academic journals in economics and in his specialty of labor economics. His specific research agenda has analyzed the role of occupational licensing for workers and consumers in the United States and other nations. His policy-oriented research has been covered in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and elsewhere. He has been a guest on many influential podcasts, webinars, and radio and television interview programs. He has testified before U.S. Senate and House committees on occupational regulation policy based on his research. In addition, his work has influenced federal executive branch policy on occupational regulation as well as state policies on occupational licensing. He has provided briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court on occupational licensing cases and has advised the World Health Organization, European Union, and Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Dr. Kleiner earned his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is currently serving as a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. In addition, he is a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis and is working with the Knee Regulatory Research Center at West Virginia University. In 2018, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Labor and Employment Relations Association for outstanding contributions to the field of industrial relations and human resources; and in 2024, he received the Economics Career Achievement Alumni Award from the University of Illinois Department of Economics.