Michael Hicks
Director of Center for Business and Economic Research
Ball State University


Nationally known for his research on energy markets and the economic impact of Wal-Mart, Michael Hicks joins Ball State’s Center for Business and Economic Research from the Air Force Institute of Technology’s Graduate School of Engineering and Management at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, where he served as an associate professor of economics, and from the Mackinac Center for Public Policy where he was an adjunct scholar.

Previously, Hicks was a tenured research professor at Marshall University. He also holds the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, serving since 1984 in North Africa, Southwest Asia, Korea, and Japan.

Hicks earned doctoral and master’s degrees in economics from the University of Tennessee and a bachelor’s degree in economics from Virginia Military Institute. He has authored two books and more than 60 scholarly works focusing on state and local public policy, including an emphasis on tax and expenditure policy, environmental regulation, alternative and traditional energy, and the economic impact of Wal-Mart on local economies.

Since its inception in 1970, the Bureau of Business Research, now the Center for Business and Economic Research, has supported business faculty and provided Indiana’s business community with research resources.