Category: Uncategorized

(Edit: My household’s dependency ratio having gone from zero to 0.33 overnight two weeks ago, in my sleep-deprived state, I had initially titled this post “Sitting on the Supply Side …,” when I truly meant “Sitting on the Demand Side ….” Apologies for the confusion.)

Jessica Hoel comments on my last post, in which I gave my usual advice to job-market candidates interviewing at ASSA:

Any advice for first-timers on the other side of the table this year?

Having sat on the demand side for the last two ASSAs, I think I can offer at least some general thoughts. A lot of those thoughts are similar to my advice to job-market candidates, but here goes nevertheless:

(Note: Too many things are keeping me busy and away from blogging these days, and it is job-market season. As such, I thought this would be a good time to post part 2 of my advice to job-market candidates from a few years ago one more time.)

It’s that time of the year again, when graduate students who are about to enter their final year in economics and related disciplines are getting ready to go on the job market.

Going on the job market is a harrowing experience for most people, however, so I thought I should help job-market candidates by sharing my advice.

This post is the second in a series of three. Today, I’d like to discuss what it’s like to interview at the annual meetings, and how you should prepare for it. The next installment will cover on-campus interviews.

Yesterday at the 2015 Paris Climate Conference (COP21), the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) released its report on the relationship between climate change and food security.

The report is titled Climate Change, Global Food Security, and the US Food System, and I am one of its (many) authors. Click here for the full report; click here for the report’s page on the website of the USDA’s Office of the Chief Economist. (Incidentally, USDA chief economist Rob Johansson is one of the alums of our PhD program.) Here is a video made to promote the report.

I learned a lot from working on this report, both about the topics it covers in general, but also about the strict standards of evidence to which government reports are held. As we were going through the many drafts this report, whenever a claim could not be substantiated by research findings, it was mercilessly struck out of the draft. The report also underwent peer review, and as those things go, it eventually went out for public comments. The end result is as comprehensive an assessment as can be of the presumed effects of climate change on global food security, and the role of the US food system in mitigating those effects. And last, but not least, I finally got to write something with my good friend Ed Carr.

Update: It turns out the New York Times has a story about the report, which you can read here.