Economists for Ukraine

A global non-profit working to end Russia's invasion, support Ukrainians, and rebuild.

About Us

We leverage economic expertise and technology to fight off Russia's invasion, increase Ukraine's resilience, and rebuild for a strong, peaceful, and prosperous future.

Our Programs in Numbers

Our programs are active since March 2022 and expanding. We respond quickly to new needs, such as setting up backup Internet in response to Russia’s terrorist strikes against Ukraine’s infrastructure. All of our initiatives are geared towards long-term sustainability and economic resilience: helping Ukraine resist now, while setting up effective frameworks for post-war reconstruction and development though digital aid platforms, resilient infrastructure, and funding science.

Below is a snapshot of what we have achieved to date. We are actively fundraising and look forward to expanding our impact with your help. All contributions are fully tax-deductible, and 100% of the funds are used for Ukraine.

1M+ Aid
Deliveries

LifeForce is Ukraine's largest real-time needs platform: food, shelter, basic supplies, medicine, transport, healthcare. 252K aid matches per month.

24 Staff in Ukraine

Our teams of Ukrainian full-time staff are in-country and deploy our technology, run our aid platforms and shelters, direct aid deliveries, & verify impact.

Direct Civilian Aid

24 Public Wifi Points
4 Physical Shelters
120 Power Banks
2,000 Mylar Blankets
80 Light Reflectors
2,500 Pairs of Shoes
Clothing
Medicine

Resilient
Internet

We have deployed a network of public wifi hotspots across the city of Odesa, with free internet for up to 50 hours during blackouts. Currently rolling out full city-wide coverage.

64 Scholars

$5k research fellowships to help Ukraine's top brains stay in Ukraine. Our fellowships help support research and teaching in Ukraine's higher education.

Non-lethal Military Aid

7 Thermal Visions
2 Thermal Drones
60 Power Banks
750 Mylar Blankets
180 Celox Bandages
153 Tourniquets
540 Hand Warmers
800 Foot Warmers

2,000+
Stories

Svidok.org is Ukraine's largest living museum of people's experiences of the full-scale invasion. All regions of Ukraine & more than 100,000 monthly users.

Sanctions on Russia

Our leadership team plays a leading role in developing sanctions for energy, finance, tech, and other critical areas as part of the Yermak-McFaul International Group on Russian Sanctions.

The LifeForce Project

Securing access to real-time, uninterrupted information about aid requirements and available resources is key to the humanitarian efforts in Ukraine.

The LifeForce Ukraine platform is ensuring a coordinated and resilient response of government and NGO resources, providing immediate support, advice and real time content on a secure platform to those who are most affected in Ukraine.

Learn more about the LifeForce Ukraine Project and how you can get involved.

Project Svidok

Svidok (Witness) is a collection of private and publicly shared war journal entries, as experienced and witnessed by Ukrainian citizens caught in the war.

The entries shared on the platform serve as a rich, time-stamped archive for evidence of war crimes committed by the Russian leadership and their military.

Learn more about Svidok and the ground truth of the unlawful occupation of Ukraine by Russia.

Rebuilding Ukraine

The damage to Ukraine’s infrastructure and economy from Russia’s war already exceeds $700 billion. Along with other economists and stakeholders, we are developing frameworks and collaboration networks to support the current and future reconstruction efforts. Learn more.

Sanctions and the Economy

Gain insights into the how sanctions and other economic tools can be leveraged to stop Russia's unprovoked aggression against Ukraine.

Assessing the Impact of International Sanctions on Russian Oil Exports

We use a unique high-frequency Russian customs data to evaluate the impact of international sanctions on Russia. We focus on Russian crude oil and oil products exports, as they are the key sources of export revenues and government finances. We find that Russia was able to redirect crude oil exports from Europe to alternative markets such as India, China, and Turkey with no loss of volumes. In particular, we find that Russian oil exports from Pacific Ocean ports, which are critical for trade with China, do not comply with the G7 price cap.

By Tania Babina, Benjamin Hilgenstock, Oleg Itskhoki, Maxim Mironov, and Elina Ribakova

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Why the disclosure of natural gas origins is important for Ukraine

The EU has banned most of Russia’s oil exports, but little action has been taken on natural gas trade. This column argues for a disclosure requirement targeted at gas traders, detailing the share of gas they buy from Russian sources. Such a measure would address the information deficit for consumers and empower supportive citizens and businesses to switch away from Russian gas. As an additional benefit, this measure would accelerate the clean energy transition in Europe.

By Iryna Sikora and Boris Vallee

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Full energy embargo: short-term pain for a brighter future

Russia is one of the top three fossil fuel producers in the world, and its economy relies heavily on revenues from oil and natural gas. A full embargo on Russian energy today by the EU alone would already decrease its GDP per capita by 1,500-2,500 USD (or 10 to 25%), a significant reduction to weaken Moscow’s capacity to sustain its aggression against Ukraine.
By Kevin Berry and Iryna Sikora

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Moscow’s Gas Freeze Shows EU-Russian Trade Is Doomed

Since Feb. 21, unprecedented sanctions have not only targeted important sectors of the Russian economy but also frozen Russian central bank reserves. The idea was to impose severe economic pain on Russia and indirectly affect its ability to sustain a prolonged war. But today, the situation has reversed, and Russia is self-sanctioning by restricting its gas supplies to the EU. Instead of reaping the revenue from the gas sale over the long term, Russia is choosing to cut the gas flow.
By Oleg Korenok and Swapnil Singh

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Strategic Insights

Gain insights into the painful truth on the ground in Ukraine, as well as long-term impact of Russia’s actions.

What game theory can tell us about the war in Ukraine

As economists specializing in behavioral economics and game theory, we teach strategic concepts from game theory to our business students. The same ideas can help us understand Russia’s current moves, predict its future behavior and derive the best strategies to achieve long-term goals.

By Anastassia Fedyk and David McAdams

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Why We Should not Allow Putin to Turn Russia-Ukraine War into a Frozen Conflict

After failing to capture Kyiv, the Kremlin focused its efforts on seizing and holding Donbas region and the south of Ukraine. In Donbass, Kremlin’s scorched-earth tactics have recently stalled. Russia’s slow advance in Ukraine combined with substantial military casualties mean that Putin desperately needs a pause in the war to regain his army’s weakening strength. This may temporarily freeze the conflict, but it will not bring a permanent peace to Europe.

By Olena Stavrunova and Mats Marcusson

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Why More Weapons Will Help Ukraine and Russia Negotiate A Lasting Truce

In any negotiation, strong positioning is the most important factor. Assistance from Ukraine’s allies would give Ukraine, the victim, more bargaining power to reach an outcome that might be acceptable. Those who focus on Ukraine making territorial concessions or blame the United States for expanding the war only weaken Ukraine’s bargaining position.
By Anastassia Fedyk

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Analyses and Proposals

Gain insights into how governments, organizations, and the international community can take actionable measures to end the war and rebuild Ukraine.

No justice, no peace?

Peace treaties don’t always bring peace. Sometimes they only change the form of war. As the world anticipates hopefully an end to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and some observers suggest that peace may come at the cost of Ukrainian territory, it’s important to remember that the short-term joy that will almost certainly accompany peace could be merely a prelude to years or decades of carnage unless the peace is just and stable.

By Dan O’Flaherty

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Time to Save Higher Education in Ukraine is Running Out

As the new academic year approaches, government officials, faculty, administrators, and students are tackling the massive challenges of keeping education going in wartime. The survival of many Ukrainian universities is now at stake due to lack of funding, displaced staff and students, and destroyed infrastructure.

By Tatyana Derugina and Margaryta Klymak

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Strengthening Financial Sanctions against the Russian Federation

In this paper, we propose further financial sanctions to increase the cost to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, based on further targeting two key vulnerabilities. The first targets Russia’s reliance on the U.S. Dollar and Western currencies as a reserve currency to back the Ruble. The second vulnerability is the Russian economy’s dependence on the Western financial system for a range of services.
By The International Working Group on Russian Sanctions

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Join Our Efforts

If you would like to stay up to date on our initiatives and hear about opportunities to help, please join our mailing list!

Leadership Team

Tania Babina

Tania Babina

Assistant Professor of Business, University of Columbia
Tania received a Ph.D. from the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina. Her research is at the juncture of corporate finance, labor economics, and entrepreneurship. More broadly, she studies inter-relationship between human capital and firm investment, financing, and organizational choices. Her current research explores drivers of entrepreneurship and factors predicting entrepreneurial success.
Website
Tatyana Deryugina

Tatyana Deryugina

Associate Professor of Finance, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Tatyana Deryugina is an Associate Professor of Finance at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her research focuses on environmental risk. She is a co-editor of JAERE and EEPE and serves on the board of editors at AEJ: Policy. She is affiliated with NBER, IZA, the E2e Project, and CESifo. Professor Deryugina holds a PhD in Economics from MIT, and a BA/BS from UC Berkeley.
Website
Anastassia Fedyk

Anastassia Fedyk

Assistant Professor of Finance, Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley
Anastassia is an Assistant Professor of finance at the Haas School of Business. Her research focuses on behavioral biases in individual and group decision-making, particularly concerning information and belief formation. She holds a PhD in Business Economics from Harvard University and a BA in Mathematics with honors from Princeton University.
Website
Yuriy Gorodnichenko

Yuriy Gorodnichenko

Quantedge Presidential Professor of Economics, UC Berkeley
Yuriy Gorodnichenko is the Quantedge Presidential professor in economics at the University of California, Berkeley, a faculty research associate at the NBER, CEPR, and IZA, and an editor of the Journal of Monetary Economics. Yuriy is an applied macroeconomist with expertise in public finance, development, international economics, and econometrics. He holds Ph.D. and M.A. degrees from the University of Michigan and M.A. and B.A. degrees from the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.
Website

James Hodson

CEO & Cofounder, AI for Good Foundation
James is the AI for Good Foundation's Co-founder and CEO, who has previously spearheaded Artificial Intelligence initiatives at a number of global firms, and has built successful (and sustainable) for-profit ventures in a variety of industries.
Website

Ilona Sologoub

Director of Political and Economic Research at Kyiv School of Economics, Editor, VoxUkraine
Ilona Sologoub started working at Kyiv School of Economics in December 2010 and now she is a KSE Management Team Member and Director of Political and Economic Research at Kyiv School of Economics. Ilona works as a Scientific Editor at VoxUkraine as well.
Website
Tetyana Balyuk

Tetyana Balyuk

Assistant Professor of Finance, Goizueta Business School, Emory University
Tetyana Balyuk is an Assistant Professor of Finance at the Goizueta Business School. Her research spans the areas of corporate finance, financial intermediation, and consumer finance with a specific focus on FinTech and lending. Tetyana holds a PhD in Finance from the Rotman School of Management as well as a CSc in International Economics from the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Prior to academia, Tetyana was an Economic Advisor for Telenor Group Ukraine.
Website

Participating Members

Andriy Bodnaruk

Professor of Finance, University of Illinois at Chicago

Valentin Bolotnyy

Hoover Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University

Sergey Chernenko

Associate Professor, Purdue University

Anastasia Danilov

Assistant Professor, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Tetiana Davydiuk

Assistant Professor of Finance, Carnegie Mellon University

Tatiana Fedyk

Associate Professor, University of San Francisco

Olena Havrylchyk

Professor of Economics, University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne

Nina Karnaukh

Assistant Professor of Finance, Fisher College of Business, Ohio State University

Mariana Khapko

Assistant Professor, University of Toronto

Andrew Kosenko

Assistant Professor, Marist College

Bohdan Kukharskyy

Assistant Professor, City University of New York (Baruch College)

Dmitry Livdan

Associate Professor, UC Berkeley

Andriy Norets

Professor of Economics, Brown University

Andrii Parkhomenko

Assistant Professor of Finance and Business Economics, University of Southern California

Roman Sheremeta

Associate Professor, Case Western Reserve University

Denis Sosyura

Professor of Finance, Arizona State University

Olena Stavrunova

Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney

Katya Vasilaky

Assistant Professor, California Polytechnic State University

A nation fertile in tradition, soil, and resources, Ukraine finds itself battling for its sovereignty and survival. The Russian invasion is bringing unimaginable suffering to Ukrainian citizens unwillingly drawn into a war.

The unprovoked escalation and relentless bombardment of non-military targets by Russian forces has triggered what is already the largest refugee crisis in Europe since WWII.

People don’t really believe in words. Or rather, people believe in words only for a stretch of time. Then they start to look for action.

Volodymyr Zelensky