2026 Best 40-Under-40 Business Professors: Julia Fonseca, Gies College of Business, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

 

Julia Fonseca
Gies College of Business
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign 

“Fonseca’s scholarly record is exceptional for an early-career economist. She’s published peer-reviewed research in top-tier finance and economics journals, including two in the Journal of Finance and two in the Journal of Financial Economics, a publication profile that other scholars might build over the course of a career. Her 2024 paper with Lu Liu, “Mortgage Lock-In, Mobility, and Labor Reallocation,” received the Brattle Group First Prize for 2025, the Journal of Finance’s highest recognition for work in corporate finance. Her pipeline of upcoming research and working papers suggests that she has no intention of slowing down. Fonseca’s work has been supported by a number of competitive grants totaling over $350,000 from Gies and the National Bureau of Economic Research, including NBER Household Finance Working Group grants and multiple Gies Business research grants. Beyond her impressive stock of funding and publications, her reputation as a scholar is reflected in her editorial appointments. She serves as Associate Editor at the Journal of Finance and the Review of Finance, two of the field’s most selective journals – a remarkable feat for a scholar early in her career. In 2022, she was named a Distinguished Referee by the Review of Financial Studies. She’s presented her research at conferences and seminars across the world, from Harvard Business School to the London School of Economics, Stanford, and Wharton.” – John Moist, Research Communications Coordinator

Julia Fonseca, 37, is an Associate Professor of Finance at Gies College of Business at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She is also a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and an Associate Editor at the Journal of Finance and the Review of Finance.

Her research interests include household finance, development finance, and labor and finance. Much of her work focuses on how finance shapes the allocation of workers across firms, jobs, and locations. Her research has been published in top finance journals and cited in media outlets such as the New York Times, the Economist, the Wall Street Journal, and NPR. Her recent work on the effects of rising mortgage rates on mobility and labor reallocation won the 2025 Brattle First Prize for Best Paper in Corporate Finance in the Journal of Finance.

Prior to joining the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, she earned a PhD in Economics from Princeton University. 

BACKGROUND 

At current institution since what year? 2019 

Education: Ph.D. in Economics, Princeton University, 2019; M.A. in Economics, Princeton University, 2015; M.A. in Economics, Getúlio Vargas Foundation (EPGE-FGV), 2013; B.A. in Economics, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), 2010. 

List of MBA/graduate business courses you currently teach: Personal Wealth Management (MSF) 

TELL US ABOUT LIFE AS A BUSINESS SCHOOL PROFESSOR 

I knew I wanted to be a business school professor when … I knew early on I wanted to be an academic and started gravitating toward finance (as opposed to other fields in economics) as a second-year Ph.D. student. 

What are you currently researching and what is the most significant discovery you’ve made from it? I’m researching across a range of topics relating to housing, labor markets, and consumer financial protection. One research agenda that my coauthors and I have been pursuing over the past few years is on the effect of rising mortgage rates on mobility, housing markets, and labor markets. The first paper in that agenda, joint with Lu Liu at the Wharton School, focuses mostly on the mobility piece. Around half of all borrowers got a new mortgage during pandemic, locking in rates close to 3% before rates rose to over 7%. The typical mortgage in the US is a 30-year fixed rate mortgage, meaning that these borrowers can keep their low rate unless they move. We find that borrowers are much less likely to move because of this added cost of moving. This is perhaps directionally unsurprising, but the magnitude of this effect is surprisingly large. Taking our estimates at face value, the 2022-23 tightening cycle reduced moving among mortgage borrowers by nearly 30%, which is comparable to the decline in the mobility of these households in recent data from the American Community Survey. 

If I weren’t a business school professor… I would be looking for another position where I could be research active. 

What do you think makes you stand out as a professor? According to my students, I’m good at articulating complex concepts in plain English, and I bring a good amount of energy into the classroom. 

Here’s what I wish someone would’ve told me about being a business school professor: If someone could have given me a heads up about a global pandemic hitting midway through my first semester of teaching, that would have been great. 

Professor I most admire and why: My colleague Heitor Almeida, for somehow managing to be both an outstanding researcher, an award-winning instructor, and doing a lot of service to our department and College. 

What do you enjoy most about teaching business students? They’re focused on real-world applicability of what they learn. 

What is most challenging? Keeping them engaged. 

When it comes to grading, I think students would describe me as… Fair. 

 

LIFE OUTSIDE OF THE CLASSROOM 

What are your hobbies? Reading, Pilates, walking or hiking. 

How will you spend your summer? Working, but also spending some time in Brazil, where I was born and raised. 

Favorite place(s) to vacation: Again, Brazil. Because most of my family and many dear friends are still there.  

Favorite book(s): Age of Innocence (Edith Wharton), Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen), Dom Casmurro (Machado de Assis), Brave New World (Aldous Huxley). 

What is currently your favorite movie and/or show and what is it about the film or program that you enjoy so much?  I haven’t really watched any movies or shows since my almost-six-year-old was born. Unless you include ones like Cars or Frozen, but I can’t say I enjoy them that much. 

 

THOUGHTS AND REFLECTIONS 

If I had my way, the business school of the future would have much more of this… An even tighter connection to policy and policymakers. Much of the research conducted at business schools is aimed at informing policy, and directly benefits from these links. We also serve our students better when we prepare them to evaluate evidence and think critically about the tradeoffs inherent to policymaking.   

I’m grateful for… Many things. My family and friends, my job, and all the support I receive from the College and from my colleagues. 

 

DON’T MISS: THE ENTIRE 2026 ROSTER OF THE WORLD’S BEST 40-UNDER-40 GRADUATE BUSINESS PROFESSORS 

© Copyright 2026 Poets & Quants. All rights reserved. This article may not be republished, rewritten or otherwise distributed without written permission. To reprint or license this article or any content from Poets & Quants, please submit your request HERE.