I’m an Economist: How much Coding Should I know?

How much coding should an economist learn?
Can coding help your research?
What language is useful? Latex? Stata? Python? R?
Are we all becoming data analysts and computer programmers?

Join us to get answers to these questions and more, with help from panelists:

Pier-André Bouchard St-Amant

Pier-André has a bachelors in mathematics, a masters, PhD and a Post-Doc in Economics. He specializes in the analysis and optimization of public policy reforms or business practices. He does so through simulated models, statistical analysis and other mathematical techniques (some call it "Business Intelligence" or "Data Science"). Pier-André's main job is at École nationale d'administration publique ("National School of Public Administration") a small postgraduate university training public servants. He also work with governments, private corporations and social groups. On top of all that, he teaches quantitative methods and economics to graduate students.

Thomas Herndon

Thomas is associate professor of economics at John Jay College, CUNY. He first became known for critiquing "Growth in a Time of Debt", a widely cited academic paper by Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff supporting the austerity policies implemented by governments in Europe and North America in the early 21st century. His research concluded that these measures may not have been necessary. Watch his famous Colbert interview here.

Tim Fong

Tim is a Data Scientist with a diverse career background. He has worked with advertising, computer vision, and net worth data. He has an M.S. in Statistics from CUNY Baruch College and a JD from the University of San Francisco School of Law. His current economics interest is in Post-Keynesian price theory.

Moderated by: Kurt Semm

Kurt is an Education Research Analyst at INET, as well as a Ph.D. Student at the New School for Social Research. He received his BA at St. John’s University in Literature and Economics and an MS from the New School for Social Research. His main areas of research are Ecology, Political Economy, and Water Resources. At the moment, his research deals with the impact of water privatization on the Southwest United States water resources allocation, regional development, and equity.