Barak H
- Research Program Mentor
PhD at University of California San Diego (UCSD)
Expertise
Economics, Political Science, Political Economy, Quantitative Social Science, and Public Policy
Bio
I enjoy investigating big questions about how economies, governments, and societies change over time. Why do some countries become prosperous while others struggle? How do new technologies reshape markets, politics, and everyday life? Why do some public policies succeed while others fall short? These questions rarely have simple answers, which is why research matters. I enjoy helping students turn broad interests into focused research questions, evaluate competing explanations, and build evidence-based arguments. My work as an economist and political scientist has taken me from the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury to the World Bank, USAID, Stanford University, and Georgetown University, where I've conducted research, taught, and mentored students. Across each of these roles, I've seen how economics, politics, and public policy interact and how understanding complex problems begins with asking good questions.Project ideas
Why Are Some Countries More Prosperous Than Others?
Why do some countries become prosperous while others struggle? Is it geography, education, natural resources, political institutions, culture, or something else? In this project, we'll investigate one of the central questions in economics and political science by exploring competing explanations, analyzing data, and comparing countries from around the world. Along the way, you'll learn how economists and political scientists develop and test ideas about economic development while building your own evidence-based argument.
How Is the Information Revolution Changing Society?
Modern markets and democratic institutions evolved in a world where information was relatively scarce, expensive to collect, and difficult to analyze. Today, digital platforms, artificial intelligence, and large-scale data collection have dramatically reduced the cost of producing, analyzing, and distributing information. These changes are transforming how businesses compete, how governments operate, how citizens participate in public life, and how societies balance innovation, privacy, competition, and democratic accountability. In this project, we'll investigate how the information revolution is reshaping relationships among individuals, businesses, and governments, and develop an evidence-based perspective on one of the defining transformations of the twenty-first century.
Who Makes the Rules in the Twenty-First Century?
Climate change, artificial intelligence, cyber threats, and digital platforms are reshaping the world in ways that increasingly transcend national borders. Although researchers and policymakers have proposed a wide range of approaches to address these challenges, translating them into policies that work has often proved far more difficult. Why? In this project, we’ll compare how different countries are responding to these global problems and investigate why some strategies succeed while others struggle.