Owen Zidar

Owen Zidar is a professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, where he also directs the Industrial Relations Section. His research explores inequality, taxation, and the role of firms and regional policy in shaping economic opportunity. Using large-scale administrative data, he studies how business ownership shapes the distribution of income and wealth, how tax policy affects workers and the economy, and how place-based fiscal policies influence growth and inequality. Before joining Princeton, he was on the faculty at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, a staff economist at the Council of Economic Advisers, and an analyst at Bain Capital Ventures. He holds a B.A. from Dartmouth College and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of California, Berkeley. A Sloan Research Fellow and NSF CAREER awardee, he is also co-author of The Everywhere Millionaire: Who Is Really Rich in America and How They Got There (Henry Holt, 2026).