Nicholas M. Kiefer *76

Nick died March 12, 2024, of complications related to cancer in Ithaca, N.Y. He was 73.

Born Feb. 28, 1951, in Tucson, Ariz., Nick grew up in Tarpon Springs, Fla. He graduated from Florida State University with a bachelor’s degree in economics. He earned a Ph.D. in economics from Princeton in 1976.

Following a postdoctoral fellowship at NIMH, Nick became an assistant professor at the University of Chicago. In 1980, he joined the economics faculty at Cornell, where he spent most of his career. He was named the Ta-Chung Liu Professor of Economics and Statistics in 1996.

Nick worked in econometrics and statistics with applications in financial economics, credit scoring and risk management in banking, consumer trend forecasting, and development of quantitative management techniques. He worked on developing structural job search models and subsequently equilibrium search models. His work on the value of information, using a dynamic programming framework, led to results on the possibility and potential optimality of learning. His work on market microstructure led to the invention of the PIN, a widely used statistic for measuring the information content of trades.

Nick is survived by his wife, Meral; and his sons Patrick, Gregory, Joseph, and Mark.

Graduate alumni memorials are prepared by the APGA.