Hester Peirce

Hester Peirce was a senior research fellow from 2012-2018. She departed Mercatus to serve on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and was sworn in on January 11, 2018.

Before joining Mercatus, Peirce served on Senator Richard Shelby’s staff on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. In that position, she worked on financial regulatory reform following the financial crisis of 2008 as well as oversight of the regulatory implementation of the Dodd-Frank Act.

Peirce served at the Securities and Exchange Commission as a staff attorney and as counsel to Commissioner Paul S. Atkins. Before that, she clerked for Judge Roger B. Andewelt on the Court of Federal Claims and was an associate at a Washington, DC law firm.

Hester Peirce earned her BA in economics from Case Western Reserve University and her JD from Yale Law School.