About the Author: Mohammed Akacem teaches economics at Metropolitan State University of Denver. His areas of research interests and teaching are Political Economy of the Middle East and North Africa as well as the Geopolitics and Economics of World Oil Markets. In addition to teaching, Professor Akacem has published his research in refereed and policy journals such as the Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Middle East Policy, Review of Islamic Economics, The Journal of Private Enterprise, OPEC Review and the Journal of Energy and Development. Dennis Dixon Miller holds the Buckhorn Endowed Chair in Economics at Baldwin Wallace University. While in graduate school he took a break to teach at the American University in Cairo, Egypt, 1982-84, and worked at both the Center for Energy and Economic Development and the Behavioral Science Institute at the University of Colorado where he earned his Ph.D. in economics in 1985. His teaching and research interests include environmental and natural resource economics and economic development. He has one honorary doctorate. He received a research scholarship at the Hoover Institute at Stanford University in 1986. He has received two year-long Fulbright Teaching Fellowships, both in Ukraine. John Leonard Faulkner graduated with a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Colorado in 1984. He also holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Colorado and an M.B.A. from the University of Michigan. His main interests and fields in economics are environmental and natural resource economics and public finance. From 1989 to 2013 he worked at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.