Experts

Pia Orrenius is a Vice President and Senior Economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. Orrenius is a labor economist working on regional economic growth and demographic change. She manages the regional group in the Dallas Fed Research Department, is executive editor of the quarterly publication Southwest Economy and co-edited Ten Gallon Economy: Sizing up Economic Growth in Texas. Her academic research focuses on the labor market impacts of immigration, unauthorized immigration and U.S. immigration policy. She is coauthor of the book Beside the Golden Door: U.S. Immigration Reform in a New Era of Globalization (2010, AEI Press).

Orrenius is affiliated with several academic institutions. She is research fellow at the Tower Center for Political Studies at Southern Methodist University and at the IZA Institute of Labor in Bonn, Germany, as well as adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. Orrenius is also adjunct professor at Baylor University (Dallas campus), where she teaches in the executive MBA program. Orrenius was senior economist on the Council of Economic Advisers in the Executive Office of the President, Washington D.C., in 2004–05, where she advised the Bush administration on labor, health and immigration issues. She holds a PhD in economics from the University of California at Los Angeles and bachelor degrees in economics and Spanish from the University of Illinois at Urbana—Champaign.

Director of the Mosbacher Institute for Trade, Economics, and Public Policy; Professor; and Helen and Roy Ryu Chair in Economics and Government

Dr. Raymond Robertson is Professor and holder of the Helen and Roy Ryu Chair in Economics and Government in the Department of International Affairs at the Bush School of Government and Public Service and the Director of the Mosbacher Institute for Trade, Economics, and Public Policy. He is a research fellow at the Institute for the Study of Labor in Bonn, Germany, and a senior research fellow at the Mission Foods Texas-Mexico Center. He was named a 2018 Presidential Impact Fellow by Texas A&M University.

Robertson earned a BA in political science and economics from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, and an MS and PhD in economics from the University of Texas at Austin. He has taught at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University and was a Visiting Professor in the Department of Economics at the Graduate School of Administration, Monterrey Institute of Technology’s Mexico City campus.

Widely published in the field of labor economics and international economics, Robertson previously chaired the US Department of Labor’s National Advisory Committee for Labor Provisions of the US Free Trade Agreements and served on both the State Department's Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy and the Center for Global Development’s advisory board.

Adrian Duhalt, Ph.D., is a Non-resident Fellow at Southern Methodist University’s Texas-Mexico Center. In his full-time capacity, he is a Research Scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy (CGEP) at Columbia University´s School of International and Public Affairs.

His professional and research interests lie at the intersection of political economy and development and policy issues concerning the energy sector in Mexico, North America and Latin America. Specifically, he has led research projects focusing on natural gas and petrochemicals, however, he has similarly had the opportunity to publish articles and reports on topics such as the ammonia-fertilizer value chain, the liberalization of the energy sector in Mexico, social conflict in energy infrastructure projects, and NOCs.

Prior to joining Columbia University’s CGEP, Adrián was postdoctoral fellow in energy studies for the Center of the United States and Mexico (CUSM) and the Center for Energy Studies at Rice University´s Baker Institute. From 2013 to 2017, he was associate professor at the School of Business and Economics at Mexico´s Universidad de las Américas Puebla (UDLAP), where he chaired the Department of International Business in 2015 and 2016. In 2014, he was the first Puentes Consortium Visiting Scholar at the Baker Institute´s CUSM.

Adrián completed a master´s degree and PhD in Economic Geography at the University of Sussex, in the United Kingdom (2012). His PhD thesis looked at the development trajectory of Mexico´s petrochemical industry and for which he received the Best PhD Thesis Award from the Economic Geography Specialty Group of the Association of American Geographers.

He is also a Non-resident Scholar at the Center for the US and Mexico at Rice University´s Baker Institute.

Manuel Sánchez is a Mexican economist with a wide-ranging professional career that includes positions in banking, central banking, and academics. He is president of ai360, an advisor to Spruceview Capital Partners, and a member of the Board of Directors of several corporations.  

From 2009 to 2016, he was a member of the Governing Board and Vice Governor at the Bank of Mexico.

Prior to this appointment, he was Director of Investment at Valanza Mexico, the private equity unit of BBVA. He joined BBVA Bancomer in 1993 as Director of Financial Analysis and Investor Relations. During 1995-97 he was Director of Planning and Finance at the Service Banking Division, and until 2004, he was the group’s Chief Economist. 

Previously, he was Director General of the Center for Economic Analysis and Research at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico. He was professor of economics there and has also taught economics at several universities, including University of York, Boston College, and The University of Chicago.  

He is the author of books and numerous articles on the Mexican economy, monetary policy, and the financial system. 

He has been a consultant for several organizations and international institutions. Previous posts include Chief Economist for Vitro Group and economist for the Alfa Industrial Group.  

Manuel Sánchez holds an M.A. and a Ph.D. in economics from The University of Chicago.