Sanford M. Jacoby was born in New York City. He is an economic historian and labor economist. Jacoby is Distinguished Research Professor of History, Management, and Public Policy at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is known for his studies of business history, labor history, labor market history, labor economics, economic thought, corporate governance, and Japanese business and labor.
Jacoby received his A.B. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1973 and his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1981.
He began his academic career at the UCLA Anderson School in 1980. He was a founding faculty member of UCLA’s Luskin School of Public Affairs and holds a position in UCLA’s Department of History. Jacoby has been a visiting professor at Cardiff University, Doshisha University, London School of Economics, University of Manchester, University of Tokyo, and Waseda University. He is co-editor of the Comparative Labor Law and Policy Journal.
Jacoby has received a series of recognitions for his work, starting with the Allan Nevins Prize from the Economic History Association. He also received the George R. Terry Book Award of the Academy of Management, and the Philip Taft Labor History Book Award.
He is a fellow of the National Academy of Social Insurance, an Abe Fellow of the Japan Foundation and Social Science Research Council, and a Career Research Fellow of the Labor and Employment Relations Association. He is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation.
