Meet the Board

The four member elected board brings a diverse background of public and private sector experience.  

Board members serve for four one year rotations as secretary, treasurer, vice president, and president.

The Board

Taylor Marr, President

Taylor Marr is the Deputy Chief Economist at Redfin, the tech-powered real estate brokerage. Marr analyzes and reports on trends in housing affordability, urban planning, and migration patterns in the United States. He also pays special attention to the national economy and new construction trends with a constant pulse on census data. Marr’s key research includes a compilation and analysis of national data on evictions, highlighting the scale of the issue and possible solutions. He also produces a quarterly analysis of US migration patterns based on an algorithm he built using Redfin.com user search data. Marr holds an MA in international and development economics from the University of Applied Sciences in Berlin, Germany and a BS from the University of South Dakota.

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Olga Yang, Vice President

Olga Yang is a Senior Commercial Property & Casualty Underwriter for The Hartford Ins Co. In 2005, she  joined the Visiting Committee in the UW Economics Department; serving as Chair of the Committee from 2008 to 2010; and is currently a member of the Executive Committee. Olga has been both a leader and participant in the Economics mentor program since its founding in 2011 and has helped to grow it to over 100 active participants. She was instrumental in the creation of the Zabriskie endowment, to ensure perpetuation of this mentorship; as well as supporting the Yanlan and Robert Yang undergraduate scholarship. She currently serves the UW Brotherhood Initiative program as a steering committee member. In short, Olga is fervently committed to the cause of education.

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Tom Goodwin, Treasurer

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Tom Goodwin is with Wealth Econometrics LLC, a consulting firm. He has experience in capital market research with Russell Investments and London Stock Exchange. He was the first Chief Economist of King County 2009-2012. He was an assistant professor of Economics at the Claremont Graduate University and published 19 papers in refereed journals. He currently provides screening and due diligence for an angel  fund of Pacific Northwest startups. He is a Board Trustee of the Chartered Financial Analysts Society of Seattle. He is received a PhD in Economics from the University of California Davis.

Spencer Cohen, Secretary
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Dr. Spencer Cohen is principal and founder of High Peak Strategy LLC, an international trade and economics research consulting firm based in Seattle, WA. He consults and writes extensively on international trade, China’s economy, industry clusters, and regional economic analysis. Dr. Cohen works with a wide range of clients and stakeholders across the U.S., including port terminal operators, industry associations, law firms, local governments, and business chambers. Dr. Cohen has a PhD in economic geography from the University of Washington. His dissertation examined China’s economic growth model through the lens of land use rights, local government finance, and local state enterprise debt restructuring. He also has an MA in China Studies, also from the University of Washington, and BA in mathematics and history from the University of Connecticut.