Mohit Karnani

Mohit Karnani

Thesis Writer

Research Fields

Development Economics, Econometrics, Industrial Organization

About Me

I am an applied microeconomist working on the intersection between development economics and empirical market design. My research focuses on evaluating how different market features (e.g. thickness in education markets) affect various welfare metrics of their participants (e.g. student dropout rates), especially in low- and middle-income countries. Overall, my research agenda aims to study the long-run, general equilibrium effects of policies that foster equality of opportunity, especially when it comes to investing in human capital. To do so, I leverage experimental and quasi-experimental program-evaluation tools and integrate them with insights drawn from empirical industrial organization to understand the equilibrium behavior of agents.

PUBLICATIONS

Effects of a Large-Scale Social Media Advertising Campaign on Holiday Travel and COVID-19 Infections: A Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial
Nature Medicine, 2021
(with E. Breza, F. C. Stanford, M. Alsan, B. Alsan, A. Banerjee, A. G. Chandrasekhar, S. Eichmeyer, T. Glushko, P. Goldsmith-Pinkham, K. Holland, E. Hoppe, S. Liegel, T. Loisel, L. Ogbu-Nwobodo, B. Olken, C. Torres, P. Vautrey, E. Warner, S. Wootton, and E. Duflo)

Effect of Physician-Delivered COVID-19 Public Health Messages and Messages Acknowledging Racial Inequity on Black and White Adults’ Knowledge, Beliefs, and Practices Related to COVID-19: A Randomized Clinical Trial
JAMA Network Open, 2021
(with C. Torres, L. Ogbu-Nwobodo, M. Alsan, F. C. Stanford, A. Banerjee, E. Breza, A. G. Chandrasekhar, S. Eichmeyer, T. Loisel, P. Goldsmith-Pinkham, B. Olken, P. Vautrey, E. Warner and E. Duflo)

Sudden Stops of Capital Flows: Do Foreign Assets Behave Differently from Foreign Liabilities?
Journal of International Money and Finance, 2019
(with M. Agosin and J. Diaz)

Impact Evaluation of a Freshmen Remedial Math Program: A Regression Discontinuity Approach
Experiencias de Innovacion Docente, 2017
(in Spanish)

 

WORKING PAPERS

Aftermarket Frictions and the Cost of Off-Platform Options in Centralized Assignment Mechanisms
R&R at Journal of Political Economy
(with A. Kapor and C. Neilson)

Screening and Recruiting Talent At Teacher Colleges Using Pre-College Academic Achievement
Submitted
(with F. Calle, S. Gallegos and C. Neilson)

Expiring Budgets and Dynamic Competition in Year-End Public Auctions: Theory and Evidence from Chile

Freshmen Teachers and College Major Choice: Evidence from a Random Assignment in Chile

Labor Shakes: Mid-Run Effects of a Large Earthquake on Regional Unemployment

 

WORK IN PROGRESS

Foreign Classmates and Student Outcomes: Evidence from Venezuelan Refugee Migration Waves
(with D. Paz)

Elite Colleges and Long Run Residential Sorting: Evidence from Centralized College Choice

Noise-Robust Change-in-Changes Estimation

RCTs meet Market Design: Treatment Effects and Spillovers under Interference in Matching Markets

Rational and Adaptive Expectations in School Choice: Evidence from Intertemporal College Admission Cutoffs

Local Cash Transfers, Price Adjustments and Competition: Evidence from a Market-Level Randomized Controlled Trial
(with C. Martinez and J. Tessada)

Teaching Experience

Undergraduate Lecturer, Taught 10 courses as a sole lecturer: Introductory Economics (2), Macroeconomics (3) and Mathematics (5) as an Instructor at University of Chile.

Graduate Lecturer, Co-Taught 2 courses on Economic Development for the MA in Economic Analysis program as an Instructor at University of Chile.

Teaching Assistant Experience

Undergraduate Teaching Assistant, Professor Sara Fisher Ellison in Principles of Microeconomics (Head TA × 2) and Professor Parag Pathak in Market Design at MIT.

Graduate Teaching Assistant, Professors Eduardo Engel, Juan Pablo Torres-Martínez and Fabián Duarte in different courses of Public Private Partnerships and Advanced Microeconomics in the MSc. and PhD. in Economics programs at UChile.

Undergraduate Teaching Assistant, Professors Dante Contreras, Pablo Tapia, Christian Belmar and Carlos Cáceres in different courses of Mathematics (TA Coordinator), Statistics, Econometrics (TA Coordinator), General Economics, Microeconomics and Labor Economics in the BSc. in Economics program at UChile.

Talks

(*Denotes coauthor presenting)

GPI (Oxford, 2022), SDSCon (Cambridge, MA, 2022), Jane Street (virtual-NYC, 2022), WEAI ×3 (virtual-Hawaii, 2021), ConsiliumBots (virtual, 2021), NBER Market Design* (virtual-Cambridge, 2020), Econometric Society* (virtual-Milan, 2020), SITE* (virtual-Stanford, 2020), ASSA (San Diego, CA, 2020), U. Chile (Santiago, 2018), LACEA & LAMES ×2 (Puebla, 2019 & Buenos Aires, 2017), FLAUC (Bogotá, 2017), CLADEA (Riverside, CA, 2017), LAWEBESS (Cali, 2017), SECHI ×2 (Santa Cruz, 2017), SINERGIA & 3ie (Bogotá, 2016) and RIDGE (Buenos Aires, 2016).

 

Posters

APPAM (Austin, TX, 2022), MIT.nano (Cambridge, MA, 2018), SECHI ×2 (Viña del Mar, 2016 & Talca, 2015), ENIN (Valparaíso, 2016) and COES & LSE (Santiago, 2016).

Referee

American Economic Review, CLADEA, Estudios Nueva Economía, Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Journal of Econometric Methods, Review of Economics and Statistics.

At MIT

Treasurer for: (i) Latinx Graduate Students Association (2021-2022), (ii) Graduate Economic Association ×2 (2019-2021), (iii) Ashdown House (2019-2020); Development Lunch Co-Organizer (2020-2021); Presidential Task-force: Beyond MIT (2020); Residential Scholar Coordinator (2019-2022); Graduate Resident Advisor (2020-), and several Graduate Student Council’s committees.

At UChile

High School Math Teacher in different institutions for underserved students (2012-2017), Volunteer in social entrepreneurship program (2012-2013).

Awards and Honors

2022
Jerry Hausman Fellowship
2022
Global Priorities Fellowship
2019
George and Obie Shultz Fund
2018
Castle Krob International Fellowship