Edmund S. Phelps is McVickar Professor of Political Economy at Columbia University and founder of Columbia's Center on Capitalism and Society. He was the 2006 Nobel Laureate in Economics.

Hans-Werner Sinn is Professor of Economics and Public Finance at the University of Munich and President of the CESIfo Group. Author of Can Germany Be Saved? The Malaise of the World's First Welfare State (MIT Press) and other books, he is former president of the International Institute of Public Finance, and former chairman of the German Economic Association.