Murshed Chowdhury

Associate Professor, Undergraduate Director (on leave)

PhD

Economics

Singer Hall 460

Fredericton

murshed.chowdhury@unb.ca
1 506 447 3203



Murshed Chowdhury received his PhD in Economics from the University of Manitoba. His research and teaching interests include open economy macroeconomics, development economics, economic growth, financial flows to the developing countries, and information and communication technology. He has published in journals including Empirical Economics, Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Journal of Economic Issues, Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Journal of Knowledge Economy, Review of Economics.

Prior joining to the University of New Brunswick, he taught at Algoma University, King’s University College at Western University, University of Manitoba, Chongqing Technology and Business University, and Shah Jalal University of Science and Technology. He also served as a consultant for United Nations Development Programme.

Selected journal articles

"Why do people from wealthy countries migrate?" (2022) European Journal of Political Economy, 73 (with N. Aziz & A. Cooray)

"Interdependencies between regulatory capital, credit extension and economic growth," Journal of Economics and Business, forthcoming (with R. Stewart & V. Arjoon).

"Banking sector distress and economic growth resilience: Asymmetric effects," Journal of Economic Asymmetries, 24, forthcoming (with R. Stewart).

"English and French Language Ability and Employability of Immigrants in Canada," International Journal of Social Economics, forthcoming (with F. Solati & N. Jackson)

“Bank stability and economic growth: trade-off or opportunities?” Empirical Economics, 61, 827-853 (with R. Stewart & V. Arjoon).

“Macroeconomic variables and stock market indices: Asymmetric dynamics in the US and Canada.” Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, 77, 62-74 (with E. Bhuiyan)

“Foreign direct investment and total factor productivity: Any nexus? Margin: The Journal of Applied Economic Research, 14(2), 164-190, 2020 (with M. Abdullah).

“Macroeconomic impacts of remittances in Bangladesh: The role of reverse flows”, Economic Notes, 48(3), 1-20, 2018 (with A. Das). DOI: 10.1111/ecno.12139

"Education and the Sustainability of Immigrant Health: Canadian Evidence", Canadian Public Policy, 44(3), 226-240, 2018 (with J. Serieux).

"Remittance Behaviour of Chinese and Indian Immigrants", Review of Economics, 67(2), 185-208, 2016 (with A. Das)

"ICT Diffusion, Financial Development and Economic Growth: New Evidence from Low and Lower Middle Income Countries", Journal of Knowledge Economy, 9(3), 928-947, 2016 (with A. Das & S. Seaborn).

“Non-Linear Dynamics of Employment, Output and Real Wages in Canada: Recent Time Series Evidence”, Journal of Economic Studies, 41(4), pp.554-568 (with A. McFarlane & A. Das).

“The Dynamics of Natural Gas Consumption and GDP in Bangladesh”, Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 22, pp. 269-274, 2013 (with A. Das and A. McFarlane).

Book chapter

“Effects of ICT Development and Economic Growth in Emerging Asian Countries”, In B. Dey, K. Sorour and R. Filleri (eds)ICTs in Developing Countries: Research, Practices and Policy Implications (2016), Chapter: 9, pp.141-159, London: Palgrave Macmillan (with A. Das and S. Khan).

Selected grants

  • New Brunswick Innovation Foundation-Social Innovation Research Grant (NBIF-SIRF)
  • New Brunswick Innovation Foundation-Research Assistantship Initiative (NBIF-RAI)
  • University Research Fund, University of New Brunswick

I am currently supervising graduate students in my concurrent research areas.

Teaching philosophy

I consider teaching as a tool that helps to empower students to make a difference in their lives as well as in the lives of those around them. As a facilitator in the classroom, I follow several principles while teaching course materials. First, I create a healthy learning atmosphere in the classroom that students get encouraged to attend the lectures. Second, I prepare my teaching notes in a way that students can learn about how economic theories can be connected to the reality. Moreover, I present course materials that promote intellectual growth and create opportunity of critical thinking for students. Finally, I design assignments and exams in a way that can motivate students to learn course materials.

I have come to understand that teachers serve as guides and motivators to students. Not everybody in a group has the same learning abilities. Some students do not need to have an overview of why particular material is important, how that material is linked to previous learning, and how the current material will be connected to the future content. However, there are students for whom this type of overview is fundamental to their learning success. I always start my lectures with a synopsis of the material to bring the class together in the same boat and then move on to the next topic. In this way, I can guide the class as a group towards the desired destination.

Courses in Economics vary from quantitative to qualitative. . One of the major challenges that I confront is that my student’s skills have a bimodal distribution, with one group of students who have a solid background in mathematics and the other group of students who are struggling with the quantitative nature of the course. To effectively teach the whole class, I modify my lecture notes in a way that the basic concepts are presented with rigorous proofs as well as with lot of examples, from very simple to difficult ones. In this way, not only can students without a strong mathematics background can catch up, but also students with a strong mathematics background can find something to gear up their knowledge. For qualitative courses, I put more emphasis on reading materials and how students can reveal important concepts from the reading materials.

Finally, I believe, teaching is a very challenging endeavour, but it is also very rewarding. Seeing students truly capturing the meaning of the material, how it relates to other courses, and how it can be used in practical applications is one of the most exciting parts of being an instructor.

As a teacher, I believe that bestowing my students with confidence in their critical thinking abilities, as well as their ability to communicate their knowledge, is of utmost importance. I have worked at perfecting my teaching strategies over the years. Teaching is a delicate process that has to be done with extreme care. I know that I have been an effective teacher, as many students have taken the time to write notes to tell me “Thank you for your teaching.”

Courses regularly taught

  • ECON6616: International Money and Finance: Theory and Practice (Graduate)
  • ECON3203: Intermediate Macroeconomics
  • ECON3016: Development Economics
  • ECON3103: Introduction to Money and Banking
  • ECON1023: Principles of Macroeconomics

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