Jason M. Barr is an American economist and author at Rutgers University-Newark, whose work is in the field of "skynomics", the study of skyscrapers and skylines using modern economics methods.Emily Badger, "How skyscrapers reveal the rise and fall American fortunes". The Washington Post, Wonkblog, Jan. 8, 2016Jason Barr. "Skyscraper height". Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, 2012, 45(3), 723-753.Henry Grabar, "Which skyscraper is tallest? It's complicated". Salon.com, Nov. 11, 2013Jeff Giles, "It's Tough Being a Young Skyscraper", The New York Times, Sept. 9, 2019 He is the author of Building the Skyline: The Birth and Growth of Manhattan's Skyscrapers, which chronicled the history of the Manhattan skyline from an economic perspective."The up and up". The Economist, Aug. 20, 2016.Jan Klerks. "Book Review: Explaining the Manhattan skyline by the numbers". Skyhigh.city. August 17, 2016
Biography Barr earned his B.S. from Cornell University in 1992, his M.F.A. in creative writing from Emerson College in 1995 and his Ph.D. in economics from Columbia University in 2002.
Research Barr's work has addressed widely held myths or misconceptions about skyscrapers and cities.Alissa Walker. "5 myths about New York City skyscrapers, debunked". Curbed.com, October 6, 2016 Jason Barr and Gerard Koeppel. "The Manhattan Street Grid Plan: Misconceptions and Corrections", January 4, 2017 For example, research performed by Barr and his colleagues showed that there was no evidence for the Skyscraper Curse, that the completion of the world's tallest building is a herald of an economic crisis.Jason Barr, Bruce Mizrach and Kusum Mundra. "Skyscraper height and the business cycle: separating myth from reality". Applied Economics, 2015, 47(2), 148-160."Towers of Babel: Is there such a thing as the skyscraper curse?" The Economist, March 28, 2015 Barr has also debunked the misconception that Manhattan's geological conditions have been the reason there are few skyscrapers between lower Manhattan and Midtown.Matt Chaban. "Uncanny valley: the real reason there are no skyscrapers in the middle of Manhattan". The New York Observer, January 17, 2012Matt Chaban. "Paul Goldberger and skyscraper economist Jason Barr debate the Manhattan skyline." The New York Observer, January 25, 2012David W. Dunlap. "450 million years ago, Hell's Kitchen earned its name". The New York Times, February 2, 2015Jason Barr, Troy Tassier and Rossen Trendafilov. "Depth to bedrock and the formation of the Manhattan skyline, 1890–1915". Journal of Economic History, 2011, 71(4), 1060-1077.Chris Weller. "6 hidden reasons why New York City looks like it does". TechInsider, September 25, 2015. Rather, Barr's work demonstrates that Midtown's origin was due to the city's demographic evolution and the fact that Manhattan is a long, but narrow, island that concentrated economic activity to a much greater degree, as compared to other cities.Richard Florida and Andrew Small. "The curious case of New York's two economic centers". Citylab.com, November 23, 2016.Jason Barr and Troy Tassier. "The dynamics of subcenter formation: Midtown Manhattan, 1861-1906". Journal of Regional Science, 2016, 56(5), 731–933. Books Building the Skyline: The Birth and Growth of Manhattan's Skyscrapers. Oxford University Press, 2016. Economic Drivers: Skyscrapers in China. Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, 2017. .
References
External links Building the Skyline - The Birth & Growth of Manhattan's Skyscrapers Building the Skyline: The Birth and Growth of Manhattan's Skyscrapers Manhattan Skyline | C-SPAN.org Skynomics Blog