David Zorn

Director – Technology & Special Projects Research, Mangum Economics

David is the Director of Technology and Special Projects and an adjunct professor at the Scalia Law School at George Mason University. He is based in Northern Virginia. Previously, David was an economist at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. For over 20 years at FDA, he worked on issues of food safety, nutrition, bioterror vulnerability, drug importation, tobacco marketing and quantitative risk assessment. He finished his time at FDA as the Director of Social Sciences. In that role, he led and oversaw research on consumer responses to labeling and public health messaging and on the economic effects of FDA policies. He has published several papers on subjects including food safety and nutrition, quantitative risk assessment and data quality.

As a consultant, David works for corporations, trade associations and non-profit organizations on issues such as benefit-cost analysis, data quality, international regulatory cooperation, state and local economic development, public administration, and regulatory policy. His current research interests include the cumulative burden of regulations and rural economic development.

He earned a Ph.D. in economics from George Mason University.