This is us

Behind the Munich International Stone Centre for Inequality Research is an interdisciplinary team of dedicated researchers, coordinators and creative minds. Together, we create spaces for critical scholarship, international collaboration and new perspectives on social inequality.

a group of people standing in front of a bookcase

Our team

Get to know the people who shape ISI – curious, clever and sometimes surprisingly different.

Anton
Düser
Science Communication Assistant

Driven by an interest in societal power structures, he links economic and political analysis to open up new ways of thinking about inequality.

Arielle Helmick
Arielle
Helmick
Managing Director

With an analytical eye, academic experience and a sense of structure, she ensures that research at ISI runs smoothly.

Michèle Loetzner
Michèle
Loetzner
Communications Director

Influenced by many years as a journalist and a keen sense of tone and timing, she gives ISI communication clarity, profile and reach.

Clara Löffler Doctoral Researcher
Clara
Löffler
Doctoral Researcher

Balancing theoretical rigor with a commitment to accessible research, she explores how wealth concentration shapes social cohesion at ISI.

Paula Noelle
Oehmig
Science Communication Assistant

Based on sociological interest and an eye for presentation, she combines structural and creative thinking to make research accessible and effectively visible.

Fabian Pfeffer
Fabian
Pfeffer
Director / Professor for Social Inequality and Social Structures, LMU Munich

Driven by curiosity, experience, and a belief in good science, he leads the creation of an institute that opens new ways of thinking about inequality.

We are hiring!

Here you will find our current vacancies.

Affiliations

Lernen Sie die Menschen kennen, die das ISI gestalten – neugierig, klug und oft überraschend anders.

Anna
Antonova
Director for the Development of Environmental Humanities at the Rachel Carson Center, LMU Munich

The critical political scientist is committed to cross-border and transdisciplinary cooperation and investigates overcoming social and environmental inequalities.

Jakob
Miethe
Assistant professor at the Department of Economics at LMU Munich.

With a focus on international capital flows and offshore financial centers, he analyses developments in the financial sector of tax havens, international real estate investments and their role in internal capital markets of multinational companies and in international tax noncompliance.

Andreas
Peichl
Head of Ifo Center for Finance and ifo Center for Macroeconomics and Surveys/ Professor of Economics, LMU Munich

His research focuses on tax and transfer systems, the effects of taxation on businesses, households and income distribution, as well as questions of tax incidence and the development of inequality and equal opportunities.

Daniel
Wilhelm
Professor of Statistics and Econometrics, LMU Munich

With research interests ranging in theoretical and applied econometrics, the statistician and economist focuses on developing statistical methods for the study of inequality and intergenerational mobility.

Fellows

Lernen Sie die Menschen kennen, die das ISI gestalten – neugierig, klug und oft überraschend anders.

Coming soon

Pipeline Program

Lernen Sie die Menschen kennen, die das ISI gestalten – neugierig, klug und oft überraschend anders.

Steven
Durlauf
Pipeline Program Mentor

Steven N. Durlauf is the founding director of the University of Chicago's Stone Center for Research on Wealth Inequality and Mobility. He is known for integrating sociological ideas into economic theories of inequality, poverty, and intergenerational mobility.

Sam
Friedman
Pipeline Program Mentor

Sam Friedman is Professor of Sociology at the London School of Economics and a leading scholar of class and inequality, with a particular focus on the cultural dimensions of contemporary class divisions.

Angelina
Grigoryeva
Pipeline Program Member

Angelina Grigoryeva is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto (Canada), where she is also affiliated with the Data Sciences Institute.

Davide
Gritti
Pipeline Program Member

Davide Gritti is a sociologist and research fellowship holder in the Department of Sociology and Social Research at the University of Trento, Italy.

Sasha
Killewald
Pipeline Program Mentor

Alexandra (Sasha) Killewald is Professor of Sociology, Director of the Stone Center for Inequality Dynamics, and the Robert F. Schoeni Research Professor at the Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, USA.

Tali
Kristal
Pipeline Program Mentor

Tali Kristal is a political economist and sociologist whose research focuses on income inequality and the distribution of income between labor and capital. She is a professor of sociology at the University of Haifa, Israel.

Shay
O´Brien
Pipeline Program Member

Shay O’Brien is a Postdoctoral Associate at the James M. and Cathleen D. Stone Center on Inequality and Shaping the Future of Work at MIT.

Mike
Savage
Pipeline Program Mentor

Mike Savage is Professorial Research Fellow at the London School of Economics’ International Inequalities Institute, where he was a founding co-Director and served as Director from 2015 to 2020. Since 2019, he has convened the Institute’s Wealth, Elites and Tax Justice research theme, which has had significant academic and policy impact.

Christophe
van Langenhove
Pipeline Program Member

Christophe Van Langenhove is Assistant Professor of Economics at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) and an Affiliated Researcher at Ghent University (UGent).

Elena
van Stee
Pipeline Program Member

Elena van Stee is a PhD Candidate in Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania and a Fellow in Sociology at Harvard University. She also serves as Managing Editor of Contexts, the American Sociological Association’s public-facing journal.

At ISI, I can combine my passion for structure with my curiosity about social fault lines. And in a team that takes concepts just as seriously as deadlines.

Arielle Helmick
Managing Director

Research changes nothing if nobody understands it. Good science communication is not an accessory: it is a prerequisite for impact. That's exactly why I like working at ISI. Because here it is clear that knowledge alone is not enough if nobody hears it.

Michèle Loetzner
Communications Director