Assistant Professor

About

Biography

I am an applied microeconomist focused on the economics of poverty. My areas of specialization are development and applied econometrics with frequent forays into fields such as health, urban, crime, and behavioral economics in addition to inter-disciplinary work in psychology. My current research is focused on: (1) the psychological consequences of poverty and their role in prolonging poverty spells; (2) social protection policies and their broad impacts; and (3) empirical issues related to measuring poverty dynamics.

Prior to joining the faculty at CSU, I spent 6 years as an assistant professor at Hamilton College after completing my PhD at the University of California, Davis. Before that, I attained a Master of Public Policy degree from Georgetown University in 2010 after which I was a junior associate in the Labor and Social Protection Unit at the World Bank.

Outside of work, I like to explore the mountains with my wife and two daughters—we hope to ski, hike, and climb in the vast wild areas of the Mountain West!

Publications

Updated list and links to publications and working papers are available here.

  • The Health Effects of In Utero Exposure to Cash Transfers (with Syeda Warda Riaz). Accepted at Journal of Human Resources.
  • Social Protection Amid a Crisis: New Evidence from South Africa’s Older Person’s Grant (2024). The World Bank Economic Review 38(2)
    (with Jeffrey Bloem & Jonathan Malacarne)
  • Income, Psychological Well-being, and the Dynamics of Poverty (2024). Economic Development and Cultural Change 72(4)
  • Income Improves Subjective Well-Being: Evidence from South Africa (2023). Economic Development and Cultural Change 71(2) (with Steve Wu)
  • Neighborhood Violence, Poverty, and Psychological Well-being (2022). Journal of Development Economics (154) 102756 (with Jeffrey Bloem)
  • The Psychological Toll of Food Insecurity (2022). Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization (204) 618-630 (with Jeffrey Bloem)
  • Do Shocks and Environmental Factors Shape Personality Traits? Evidence from the Ultra-Poor in Uganda (2022). Journal of Development Studies. (with Sikhar Mehra and Yaniv Stopnitzky)
  • Economic Life in Refugee Camps (2017). World Development (95) 334-347 (with J. Ed Taylor, Anubhab Gupta, Irvin Rojas, & Ernesto Gonzalez)
  • Economic Impact of Refugees (2016). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113(27) 7449–7453 (with J. Ed Taylor, Mateusz Filipski, Anubhab Gupta, Irvin Rojas, & Ernesto Gonzalez)