Purvi Sevak is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at Hunter College at the City University of New York. She received her Ph.D. (2002) and M.A. (1998) degrees in Economics at the University of Michigan. Before attending graduate school at Michigan, she received a B.S. degree (1995) in Policy Analysis from Cornell University and spent two years as a research assistant for the Lewin Group, a health policy consulting firm in Virginia.

Professor Sevak's research to date has concentrated on issues related to retirement.  Her dissertation was the first scholarly paper to examine the effect of the stock market boom in the late 1990s on retirement behavior. She subsequently examined the effects of the fall in stock prices on retirees and is currently examining the effect of house prices on retirement timing. Other areas of interest have included the responsiveness of retiree residential location to property taxes and school spending, the effect of taxes on retiree labor supply, the fertility, mortality and savings of immigrants, and the financial consequences of widowhood. Much of her research has been funded by the United States Social Security Administration.

Purvi lives in Tribeca with her husband and two daughters. She spends much of her time serving two organizations that are dear to her – she is President of the Hunter College High School Alumnae/i Association and a member of the Board of Directors of the Hudson River Park Mothers Group.