After undergraduate work at the University of Michigan where he was a James B. Angell scholar and the University of Minnesota where he received two summa cum laude degrees in mathematics and economics, Professor Grinols earned his Ph.D. from MIT in 1977. Since then, Dr. Grinols has held positions in government and academia including Cornell University, the University of Chicago, the University of Washington, MIT, the University of Illinois, Department of the Treasury, and as Senior Economist for the Council of Economic Advisers. He was a founding member and first president of Illini Christian Faculty and Staff at the University of Illinois and presently serves as president of The Association of Christian Economists.

Dr. Grinols' work has resulted in many articles and books in the fields of international economics, public finance, and macroeconomics. Professor Grinols was one of the first academicians to recommend to Congress (in 1994 testimony) that it establish a national commission to study the impact of casino gambling. The National Gambling Impact Study Commission was formed in 1996, and produced its final report in 1999 recommending a moratorium on gambling expansion. Dr. Grinols gambling research is presented in Gambling in America: Costs and Benefits (Cambridge University Press, 2004). The economics of publicly provided private goods with application to the economics of a national health care framework is Dr. Grinols' current interest. His research focuses on identifying and promulgating a framework satisfying a fourfold requirement of universal access, personally responsive portable coverage, respect for the marketplace, and fail safe cost containment by government of its injections into the health care sector. His current book, Health Care for Us All: Getting More for our Investment, co-authored with Professor James Henderson of Baylor is forthcoming.