Christopher Witko

Christopher Witko is currently Professor and Associate Director of the School of Public Policy at Pennsylvania State University. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, an M.A. from SUNY Albany, and B.A. from SUNY Plattsburgh. Before earning his Ph.D. and becoming a faculty member, Witko worked as a transportation analyst in the New York State Senate and as a front-line bureaucrat implementing youth job and training programs for the Suffolk County (NY) Department of Labor.

Professor Witko’s research focuses mostly on how public policies shape and respond to economic outcomes like unemployment and inequality, and the role of the public and organized interests in shaping public policy. His book, The New Economic Populism: How States Respond to Economic Inequality (Oxford University Press) won the State Politics and Policy Section’s Virginia Gray best book award in 2018. Witko has been part of research teams funded by the Russell Sage Foundation and the Norwegian Research Council and has taught in Spain and Korea.