Ryan Decker

Dr. Ryan Decker is an Associate Professor of Economics and Finance and serves as the Founding Director of North Central College's Center for Financial Literacy.

Dr. Decker is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™. CFP® professionals must meet rigorous education, examination, experience, and ethical requirements. The CFP® is the premier certification within the wealth management industry. CFP® professionals have made a commitment to act as a fiduciary when providing financial advice to a client. Dr. Decker is eager to bring his CFP® education and experience into the classroom as he teaches the next generation of fiduciary wealth managers.

Dr. Decker is passionate about improving financial literacy at all levels of society. Dr. Decker is an accomplished international public speaker, presenting at conferences, high schools, universities, not-for-profits, and corporations as it pertains to financial education.

Dr. Decker is the Founder and Lead Educator at Wealthency, a provider of corporate financial education programs which aid in decreasing employee financial stress levels and increasing productivity and retention. Dr. Decker believes that every member of society should have an opportunity to be financially literate.

Prior to teaching, Dr. Decker was an experienced Manager at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). Dr. Decker worked predominantly in the Financial Transactions Transfer Pricing practice, based in Chicago. Dr. Decker became a national expert on treasury-related transfer pricing issues and assisted treasury and tax teams of multinational corporations in designing, pricing, documenting, and defending transactions including intercompany revolvers, loans, cash pooling, and other financial instruments.

Aside from focusing on financial transactions, Dr. Decker worked with clients in the consumer products, large manufacturing equipment, and web-based sectors. Dr. Decker achieved considerable experience with intellectual property-related transfer pricing issues as he assisted a large multinational client (global revenue approx. $80B) strategically negotiate a series of bilateral and unilateral Advance Pricing Agreements in the US, and abroad, related to intellectual property licensing transactions in the consumer products industry. Dr. Decker's real-world applications of accounting, economics, and finance help bridge the gap between classroom theory and actual international business incentives and operations.

Dr. Decker is a published author and is experienced in performing macro- and microeconomic research and analyses relating to a variety of issues including transfer pricing adjustments in recessionary environments, the economic useful life of advertising, incentives within licensing arrangements, negative interest rates, profit split methodologies encompassing multiple taxing jurisdictions, realistic professional case studies, and the importance of financial education.

As a hobby, Dr. Decker founded one of the nation's first sports betting information service companies. At its peak, the service was one of the largest sports betting information services that used math to find arbitrage opportunities, positive expected value bets, and middle opportunities and reported them to users via Discord in real time.

Dr. Decker is a proud graduate of North Central College, earned his Ph.D. in Economics at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and completed his CFP® coursework at Boston University.

Most importantly, Ryan is a loving husband and father of two. He resides in the western suburbs of Chicago, IL.

Selected Scholarship

Decker, R., Dadzie, R., Beavers, R. (2022). Financial Literacy and Behaviors of Private College Undergraduates. Journal for Research and Practice in College Teaching, 7(1), 18-42

Decker, R., & Gray, D. (2021). Transfer Pricing Case Study: Computing Devices, Inc. Intercompany Loan, Journal of Financial Education

Decker, R., Chandrasekhar, K., and Rostagno, M. (December 29, 2016). Negative Interest Rates: A Transfer Pricing Perspective, Tax Management Transfer Pricing Report, Vol. 25. https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/tax/transfer-pricing/assets/bloomberg-bna-transfer-pricing-report-negative-interest-rates-a-transfer-pricing-perspective%20.pdf

Decker, R., Dadzie, R., Dust, A., and Lostumbo, N. (November 23, 2015). Profit Splits Post-BEPS: Quantifying an MNE’s Intangibles, Tax Notes International, Volume 80:8. https://www.pwc.com/us/en/tax-services/publications/profit-splits-post-beps.html

Decker, R., Fijol, D., Ilic, I. (2016). Chapter 6: Resale Price Method (RPM) and Alternatives to Traditional Buy-Sell Distributors. In William H. Byrnes (ed), Practical Guide to U.S. Transfer Pricing, Third Edition, LexisNexis Group. https://store.lexisnexis.com/products/practical-guide-to-us-transfer-pricing-third-edition-skuusSku60720

Courses Taught

SBEN 210 Personal Finance

ECON 200 Principles of Microeconomics

ECON 310 Economics of Sports

ECON 320 Industrial Structure and Public Policy

ECON 365 Econometrics

FINA 370 Wealth Management

FINA 440 Principles of Insurance

MFIN 630 International Trade, Taxes and Transfer Pricing