Today’s world is a reflection of both economic forces and the choices we have made. Between globalization, new technologies, and our institutional environment, out society is changing rapidly. Our policies should be changing with it. My research is focused on assessing how the institutions, regulations, and safety nets we have built contribute to individual and societal social welfare.

My dissertation was focused on self-employment, independent contracting, spot market work, multi-job holding, and online gig work. I was interested in understanding how these nonstandard work arrangements interacted with the changing nature of work, and policies like the Fair Labor Standards Act, Unemployment insurance, the Earned Income Tax Credit, and the Affordable Care Act. 

I believe that before we can build better policy, we need to understand what exactly our current ones are doing, and what can be done to improve them. Through the use of quantitative data methods and research designs for causal identification, I hope to help improve the world, even if it is just by a little bit at a time.