Eileen Norcross is a senior research fellow with the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. As lead researcher on the Mercatus Center's State and Local Policy Project, she focuses on the question of how societies sustain prosperity and the role civil society plays in supporting economic resiliency. Her primary research interests include fiscal federalism and institutions, state and local governments, and economic development.

Norcross has testified before Congress on a variety of topics, including the Community Development Block Grant program and the use of technology to monitor stimulus funding. A cofounder with fellow Mercatus Center scholar Jerry Brito of the website StimulusWatch.org, she is also interested in the impact of technology on social change.

Before joining the Mercatus Center, Norcross was the 2001-2002 Warren Brookes Fellow in Journalism at the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington, DC. Norcross has also worked for KPMG as a consultant with their transfer pricing division and as a research analyst with Thompson Financial Securities Data.

A native of New Jersey, Norcross received her MA in Economics from Rutgers University in 1996. She graduated summa cum laude from Rutgers University in 1993 with a BA in Economics and U.S. History.

Her work has been cited in numerous media outlets, and her op-eds have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Times, Forbes, and the New Jersey Star-Ledger.

Norcross blogs on state and local issues at Neighborhood Effects