Image

Associate Professor of Economics Veronika Dolar, PhD, is an economist whose research spans labor, health, and sports economics, exploring how deeply structural inequalities shape opportunity—whether in the realm of Olympic performance or everyday life.

As a dedicated faculty member in Pace’s award-winning Economics department, she integrates real-world data and research into both her teaching and the mentoring of undergraduate students, empowering them to produce their own publishable work.

Economics and the Olympic Dream: A Quest to Make Data Human

Dolar’s recent work explored how income inequality affects national performance at the Winter Olympic Games. Her findings are both striking and sobering: nations with greater income inequality consistently send smaller delegations and win fewer medals, even after accounting for GDP, population, and institutional factors.

“While anyone can, in principle, qualify for the Olympics, the cost of elite training, coaching, equipment, and facilities make participation inaccessible to many,” she explained.

Using data from every Winter Games between 1992 and 2022, Dolar’s research treats Olympic success as an indicator of how effectively societies convert human capital into achievement. She has isolated the causal impact of inequality on performance, offering a fresh bridge between macroeconomic theory and sports analytics.

Through her research, presented at conferences from the Eastern Economic Association to the Center for Sociocultural Sport and Olympic Research, Dolar has created interactive data visualization tools, accessible to policymakers and journalists, but also students at Pace.

Teaching Economics Through Real-world Stories

Dolar’s classroom reflects the same passion for connection between theory and practice and illuminates how economic structures shape opportunity in all areas of life.

Her economic inequality course, for example, integrates her own research, allowing students to work directly with the same datasets she uses in her publications. Students then become researchers in the process, replicating analyses using real data—from the World Bank to the Standardized World Income Inequality Database—and extend the work to areas such as education and healthcare.

“Economics isn’t just about money or markets,” she emphasized. “It’s about human potential and fairness—who gets to compete and succeed.”

Mentoring Through Research and Collaboration

Dolar also models the power of collaboration through student research in other ways.

An example is her partnership with undergraduate students, such as Fatima Abba ’26, to co-develop a manuscript inspired by Robert Reich’s Wealth & Poverty lecture series. What began as lecture summaries evolved into a project blending theory, data, and narrative to explore global inequality. Supported by the Dyson Student-Faculty Summer Research Award and Omicron Delta Epsilon, it will serve as a foundation for Dolar’s future textbook, Understanding Economic Inequality: An Introductory Guide Through Real-World Economics.

“It was transformative,” she reflected. “The students gained hands-on experience with data, writing, and policy analysis. It showed them that research can become real scholarship.”

Reimagining How Economics Is Taught

Image

In recent years, Dolar has also taken on the challenge of modernizing and reshaping how economics is taught in classrooms at Pace and beyond, and with that, a chance to make economics engaging and relevant to a new generation of students.

To this end, she has co-authored the 7th editions of ECON MACRO and ECON MICRO (Cengage Learning, 2024), texts that connect theory to everyday examples—from the competition between Ben & Jerry’s and Häagen-Dazs to the recent spike in egg prices.

“Economics, especially macroeconomics, has changed dramatically,” she said. “And our textbooks need to reflect that reality.”

In addition, Dolar has illuminated the continuing exclusion and underrepresentation of women within the economics profession (a trend, by the way, that Pace is bucking) through co-authoring another work, Missing Voices in Economics: Addressing the Gender Gap (Palgrave MacMillan, 2026). The book has been utilized in her Pace course on Economics of Gender, Race, and Class, integrating its findings into classroom discussion and analysis.

The Heart of Her Work: Making a Difference

Whether in her research, authorship of textbooks, or mentorship of students, Dolar’s passion is clear: helping others understand the world so they can make it better.

“What motivates me is seeing that ‘aha’ moment when students realize economics can explain the forces shaping their lives. That curiosity and empowerment are what make this work so rewarding,” she said.

Elisabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University’s Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) Team earned top honors at the New York Law School NIL and College Sports Negotiation Competition, held March 7–8, with one Pace Haub Law team winning the championship and the other finishing as runner-up.

The competition, which featured 14 teams, focused on the rapidly evolving legal landscape surrounding Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) rights in college athletics. Competing teams negotiated complex agreements involving athlete endorsements, sponsorship deals, and university partnerships, with judges drawn from attorneys and professionals working in the NIL and sports law fields.

Pace Haub Law was represented by two ADR teams. Rebecca Ferguson (3L) and Zach Ouladelhadjahmed (2L) emerged as competition champions, while Alexa Stack (2L) and Asly Abbas (2L) advanced to the final round and finished as runner-up. The teams were coached by alumna Andrea Garcia ‘24 and student coach Madeline M. Law (3L), who currently serves as Executive Productions Editor of Pace Law Review and Alternative Dispute Resolution Director for the Pace Law Advocacy Program.

“This was a challenging and unique competition,” said student coach Madeline Law (3L). “I was thrilled to assist the teams as a coach, which gave me a new perspective compared to my usual role as a competitor. I am incredibly proud of both teams for their preparation, professionalism, and ability to think creatively under pressure.”

Louis Fasulo, Professor of Trial Practice and Director of Advocacy Programs at Pace Haub Law, praised the students’ performance and the continued growth of the Law School’s advocacy and ADR programs. “Our students continue to demonstrate exceptional skill and professionalism in national advocacy competitions,” Professor Fasulo said. “This result reflects the depth of talent within our ADR team and the dedication of the students and coaches who work tirelessly to prepare. Having two Pace teams reach the final round speaks volumes about the strength of our program and the experiential learning opportunities we provide.”

The competition is designed to give law students hands-on experience negotiating agreements in the increasingly complex world of collegiate athletics and NIL regulations. For Pace Haub Law students, the victory highlights the continued success of the Law School’s Advocacy Program and ADR Team, which regularly compete and place in national competitions. With both teams advancing to the final round and securing first and second place, the event marked another significant achievement for Pace Haub Law’s advocacy students and coaches.