To apply for a Tobin RA, submit your resume, as well as a completed application form to:

• Prof. Tony Smith (Director of Undergraduate Studies in Economics, email: tony.smith@yale,edu),
• Qazi Azam (Undergraduate Registrar for the Department of Economics, email: qazi.azam@yale.edu), and
• The professor sponsoring the assistantship.

You may apply for more than one Tobin RA. The application deadline is Friday, January 13.

The Tobin RAs are named after James Tobin, a prominent member of the the Department of Economics at Yale from 1950 to 2002 and the winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1981. He was an avid supporter of involving undergraduate in research in economics and was the leader of "Tobin's 'army' — generations of undergraduates [who] became part of an intellectual adventure ... and were instilled with the desire to devote knowledge and reason to the betterment of society" (quoted in "Remembering James Tobin: Stories Mostly from His Students," by Robert Goldfarb, Eastern Economic Journal, 2003).

1. "Agricultural Investment and Insurance in Ghana"
      Prof. Christopher Udry, email: christopher.udry@yale.edu

This project analyzes data from a large field experiment in Ghana on agricultural investment and insurance. This is a multi-year study in which we are learning why farmers do not make investments which many believe to be profitable: is it due to lack of capital, lack of insurance, or perhaps maybe it is due to the investment not actually being profitable. Many data are now in on this project and the work will require extensive Stata programming in order to organize the data, clean the data, analyze the results, and help prepare tables and graphs for papers and presentations.

2. "Early Childhood Development and Family Background"
      Prof. Costas Meghir, email: c.meghir@yale.edu

It is becoming well established that events and investments in early childhood are crucial for later outcomes, including educational attainment, employment and earnings. This has motivated research into the determinants of early childhood development as well as search for policies that can improve early childhood stimulation and nutrition. As part of a set of ongoing projects,  I am looking for an undergraduate research assistant to help describe and analyze the newly available data on early childhood development in Chile. The aim of the project will be to describe the relationship between cognitive development, family background and resources. As the variable definitions are in Spanish, knowledge of the language is an advantage; however other creative ways of dealing with the language issue are also acceptable. The RA will have to use Stata as a tool for analyzing the data.

3. "Innovation and Production in the Global Economy"
      Prof. Costas Arkolakis, email: costas.arkolakis@yale.edu

The research assistant for this project will work with multinational sales data and the model of trade and multinational production developed in the paper "Innovation and Production in the Global Economy" (by C. Arkolaksi, N. Ramondo, A. Rodriguez-Clare, S. Yeaple).  He/she will be required to manage (and improve) existing algorithms for estimation of a nonlinear system of equations. The purpose of the estimation is to identify the parameters of the model developed in the aforementioned paper.

4. "Experiments on Microfinance in Developing Countries" or "Social Media and Charitable Fundraising in the United States"
      Prof. Dean Karlan, email: dean.karlan@yale.edu

The first project analyzes data from experiments in developing countries on microfinance and other policy experiments. The research assistant must either know Stata already or be comfortable taking on the task of learning Stata independently, and quickly. Alternatively, applicants interested in a project on social media and charitable fundraising in the United States should express an interest in that. Stata is not required for this second position, but rather resourcefulness, creativity, and design instincts are key for helping to design a platform to use for research on charitable fundraising.

5. "Youth Unemployment in Sub-Saharan Africa"
      Prof. Gustav Ranis, email: gustav.ranis@yale.edu

This project examines youth unemployment in sub-Saharan Africa. Young people in sub-Saharan Africa have special difficulties in finding productive jobs; their unemployment or, more relevant, underemployment rates are substantially higher than those for adults. In the rural sector higher fertility rates and in the urban sector in-migration rates put additional pressure. The research, heavily focussed on literature survey, is intended to examine both supply (e.g., education) and demand (e.g., job opportunities) dimensions, both at the macro and micro levels. The RA should have an interest in development, be willing to do both literature survey and statistical work and, hopefully, have an interest in Africa.

6. "Disease and Development: The 1918 Influenza in India"
      Prof. Daniel Keniston, email: daniel.keniston@yale.edu

The 1918 influenza was the last major global pandemic, and India was the epicenter of the epidemic. The short-term costs were horrific — an estimated 15 million dead in India alone — but the long-term effects are largely unknown. Did areas severely affected by the influenza continue to malinger long afterwards? Or could were the long-term consequences neutral or even positive for the worst hit areas? In this project we will assemble a new, detailed dataset on births, deaths, agricultural production, wages, and other economic indicators from early/mid-20th-century India, which we will use to address these questions. The RA will assist in preparing the datasets and preliminary analyses, and must have a basic familiarity with Stata and an interest in learning more.

7. "Economic Aspects of Natural Sources of New Drugs"
      Prof. William Nordhaus, email: william.nordhaus@yale.edu

Studies of the impacts of environmental changes such as global warming raise concerns about the destruction of ecosystems, such as tropical forests. One of the concerns is the loss of valuable species that could be used for medical purposes. This research will look at new drugs developed over the last 3 decades and examine their laboratory development and biological origins. The development will be linked to economic benefits in terms of dollar value and use. The research may help inform public policy about the economic value of preserving certain ecosystems.