Background
Sohn was born and raised in South of Korea.
Sohn was born and raised in South of Korea.
He graduated from Gwang-ju Che-il High School in 1962. He earned his Master"s in economics from Wayne State University, and his Doctor of Philosophy in the same field from University of Pittsburgh. One of Sohn"s Doctor of Philosophy advisors, Professor Whitman, left Pittsburgh to become a member of the President"s Council of Economic Advisors under the Nixon administration.
She was so impressed by his work that she brought him on board as senior economist at the White House.
He is currently the Martin V. Smith Professor of Economics at California State University, Channel Islands. He came to the United States that year to study economics as an undergraduate at the University of Florida in Gainesville on a partial scholarship. He also earned an Program for Management Development from Harvard Business School.
On the White House Council, he was responsible for economic and legislative matters pertaining to the Federal Reserve and financial markets.
His weekly economic and financial report to the President earned him attention from President Nixon. A New York banker introduced Sohn to the president of the Northwest National Bank of Minnesota, where Sohn would move for his next job.
He remained with the bank through various name changes and mergers, as it became Norwest Corporation and then purchased Wells Fargo in 1998, and rose to the position of Executive Vice President and chief economist. He was chosen as one of the 100 most influential Minnesotans of the 20th century by the state"s largest newspaper, the Star Tribune.
Others on the list included Charles Lindberg, Sinclair Lewis, Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale and Charles M. Schulz.
In January 2005, Sohn moved from Minneapolis to Los Angeles to take up a position as president and Chief Executive Officer of Hanmi Bank. After more than three decades in Minnesota, he stated that he was looking forward to moving to a warmer climate with a larger Korean American population. He retired from that position in December 2007.
He would later become the vice chairman of fashion retailer Forever 21.
In 2008, he joined the faculty of California State University, Channel Islands as Martin V. Smith Professor of Economics. He also serves on the boards of Western Alliance Bancorporation and Claremont Graduate University.
He was on the boards of First California Bank, Ministers Mutual Life Insurance Company, Los Angeles He is the author of two books, Global Financial Crisis and Exit Strategy in 2009, and The New Economy in 2014.
In 2011, Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa appointed him a member of the Los Angeles Harbor Commission, which has oversight authority for the Portuguese of Los Los Angeles