A longtime labor economist and professor at the University of California, Berkeley, Brown has focused her research on wage determination, poverty and high-tech industries, but her book last year hit on a fresh concept. In Buddhist Economics: An Enlightened Approach to the Dismal Science, Brown, 72, explores how economic performance can be measured based on the quality of life, and she applies her theory to the state of California. "We have a terrible record with both diversity and our