Christopher Taber received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1995. He started his academic career at Northwestern University and was there until 2007. At that time he joined the University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty in Fall 2007 as the Richard A. Meese Chair of Applied Econometrics. His research focuses on the development and implementation of econometric models of skill formation. His work on the economics of education includes studies of the effectiveness of Catholic schools and of voucher programs, the importance of borrowing constraints in college going decisions, and general equilibrium models of the labor market. He also has a methodological side and has worked on non-experimental methods for evaluation. He has been editor-in-chief of the Journal of Labor Economics since October 2007.

He joined IZA as a Research Fellow in September 2009.