The Mixtape with Scott

Welcome back to The Mixtape with Scott. I’m currently in the process of putting together a new slate of interviews, and while it’s not quite ready yet, I didn’t want to leave you hanging. So in the meantime, I’m re-sharing some conversations from earlier seasons — episodes that I think are worth revisiting or perhaps discovering for the first time.Today’s rerun is from Season Two, and it’s one of my favorite interviews from that time: my conversation with Ariel Pakes, the Thomas Professor of Economics at Harvard University.This was such a fun and rich interview. People either know Dr. Pakes very well or only by the letter “P”. He’s a towering figure in industrial organization and structural econometrics, with landmark contributions both theoretical and applied. Among many things, he’s the “P” in the Berry-Levinsohn-Pakes model — BLP — which remains one of the most influential tools for estimating demand in differentiated product markets. That paper — Automobile Prices in Market Equilibrium — published in Econometrica in 1995, has had a ripple effect not just in economics, but well beyond it.But this interview wasn’t just about methods and models. Dr. Pakes and I talked about basketball, about growing up in a radical socialist youth group, about his early love of philosophy, and his own path through Harvard as a young man trying to straddle economics and philosophy before finding his place. He spoke softly, with depth and reflection, and he offered a glimpse into how he works — by getting himself in way over his head and then slowly, patiently, working his way out. It’s a way of thinking that hasn’t just shaped his own work but has helped shape the rest of ours too.I hope you enjoy this one as much as I did. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe

Greetings from Cambridge! I’m still mid-move and not fully settled—classes kick off next week and I’m wrapping the last bits of admin—so I’m sharing one more rerun before we close out Season 4.Today’s guest is a Cambridge neighbor just down the Charles at MIT: Dr. Amy Finkelstein, John Bates Clark Award–winning economist.If you’re new to her work: Amy is a leading health economist at MIT and coauthor of We’ve Got You Covered (with Liran Einav), a timely book from a couple of years ago. In it, they argue for universal basic coverage that guarantees financial protection from major medical costs, while leaving room for supplemental private insurance—simple, fair, and focused on what insurance is actually for.In our conversation we cover the Oregon Medicaid Experiment and the ideas that shaped it, plus the arc of her career. I loved this one. Hope you enjoy the rerun.Scott's Mixtape Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe

Greetings everyone. I’m still in moving mode, packing up life in Texas and getting ready for a year in Boston. I hit the road on Friday of this week for a three day road trip and am still behind on everything. That means the podcast is still on reruns for now, but I should have a new episode for you next time. This week’s rerun is one I really liked, though—my conversation from two years ago with Steven Berry.Steven is the Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale and the inaugural Faculty Director of the Tobin Center. His work in industrial organization has shaped how economists think about markets in equilibrium, and his research spans industries from autos to airlines to media. He’s also a winner of the Frisch Medal, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and one of the field’s most respected voices.We talked about his path into economics—from the Midwest, to Wisconsin, to a career that’s helped define modern empirical IO. Naturally, we dug into the BLP model, the landmark framework he developed with James Levinsohn and Ariel Pakes that changed how we estimate demand in differentiated product markets. It’s one of those ideas that’s both deeply technical and hugely practical in policy and business.If you missed it the first time, I think you’ll enjoy hearing Steven reflect on his career, his collaborators, and where the field is headed. Here’s my rerun conversation with Steven Berry.Scott's Mixtape Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe

I’m still going through some older reruns for the summer due to my travel schedule. This one is an interview with Rocío Titiunik, a quantitative methods political scientist and professor in the department of politics at Princeton University, as well as a researcher that has been at the frontier of work on regression discontinuity designs. Her name is synonymous with cutting-edge work on regression discontinuity design, developed in close collaboration with scholars like Sebastián Calonico, Matías Cattaneo, and Max Farrell. Together, they’ve shaped the modern landscape of causal inference, not only through groundbreaking theory but also through widely used software tools in R, Stata, and Python. In addition to her contributions to quantitative methodology, Rocío’s applied research — from electoral behavior to democratic institutions — has become a major voice in political science. She also holds a formidable editorial footprint: associate editor for Science Advances, Political Analysis, and the American Journal of Political Science, and APSR. It’s no exaggeration to say she helps steer the field as much as she contributes to it.In this older interview, Rocío shared how her journey into economics began not with data, but with theory, literature, and the big questions that led her to the discipline. Her path into Berkeley’s PhD program in agricultural and resource economics was anything but linear, and even once there, she wasn’t sure how all the parts of herself — the scholar, the immigrant, the thinker — would fit together. During our conversation, she opened up about moments of uncertainty, of feeling lost in the sheer vastness of academic economics. Her honesty was disarming. It reminded me that no matter how decorated someone’s résumé may be, we’re all just trying to find our way — and sometimes, the most important breakthroughs happen when we admit we haven’t arrived yet.Thanks again for tuning in! I hope you like listening to this older podcast interview. Scott's Mixtape Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe

Tymon Słoczyński, an econometrician and assistant professor at Brandeis University, shares his journey from Poland to academia, exploring historical migration patterns and their influence on modern diversity. He engages in discussions on causal inference in econometrics, critiques traditional methodologies, and highlights the evolution of research techniques. Tymon also reflects on the art of academic writing, revealing insights into clarity and precision in conveying complex ideas. Their light-hearted reminiscence about childhood vacations adds a personal touch to this engaging conversation.

Welcome to the Mixtape with Scott — an interview-based podcast where I, Scott Cunningham, talk to living economists about their personal lives. I continue my travels in Europe without a good microphone, which has caused me to delay my newest interviews a little bit longer. Therefore this week’s episode is an oldie but a goodie — Jon Roth, a young econometrician at Brown University. Jon has had many high profile publications to his name already in a short period of time, many of which center around difference-in-differences. Several have focused on the event study (e.g., here, here and here) , whereas others have focused on the logarithm both within diff-in-diff but also outside of it. I think it is fair to say that Jon’s econometric contributions have been unusually practical to applied researchers while also scientifically robust and accurate. I remember enjoying this conversation with Jon a great deal, and if you haven’t listened to it, it’s a great time to do so now, and if you have listened to it, it’s a great time to listen to it again! Thank you again for all your support!Scott's Mixtape Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe

Mohammad Akbarpour, an economic theorist at Stanford University, shares his fascinating journey from Tehran to academia. He reflects on his early life in Iran, the competitive educational landscape, and the cultural dynamics of pistachio farming. The conversation touches on his transition from electrical engineering to economics and how mentorship shaped his career. Akbarpour also explores the unique kidney market in Iran and the interplay between economics and computer science, offering fresh insights into social networks and disease dynamics.

Welcome back to The Mixtape with Scott, a podcast about the lives and stories of living economists. This show often unfolds in themed mini-series, and lately I’ve been exploring one that I’ve been curious about for a while: the economists who navigated and participated in the heterodox tradition in economics. Today’s guest is Amitava Krishna Dutt, a development economist, now emeritus at the University of Notre Dame. His work sits at the intersection of structuralist macroeconomics, post-Keynesian theory, and development, with deep engagement in political economy. He’s long been committed to questions of global inequality, the dynamics of capitalist growth, and the limitations of orthodoxy in addressing the needs of the Global South.So thank you for tuning in. I hope this is as interesting to you as it was to me.Scott's Mixtape Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe

Welcome to this week’s episode of The Mixtape with Scott. Today’s podcast guest is our 127th guest on the show—Vitor Possebom, Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics at the Fundação Getulio Vargas. Vitor’s research sits at the intersection of two areas — econometrics and causal inference, and policy evaluation in Latin America, particularly Brazil. His contributions revolve around refining and extending tools for estimating causal effects in observational data, especially under common data imperfections like selection bias, measurement error, and treatment effect heterogeneity.* Sample selection and marginal treatment effects (e.g., “Identifying Marginal Treatment Effects in the Presence of Sample Selection” (Journal of Econometrics), “Crime and Mismeasured Punishment” (Review of Economics and Statistics))* Misclassification and measurement error (e.g., “Potato Potahto in the FAO-GAEZ Productivity Measures?”)* Inference and sensitivity in synthetic control methods (e.g., “Cherry Picking with Synthetic Controls”, “Synthetic Control Method: Inference, Sensitivity Analysis and Confidence Sets”)* Probability of causation in non-experimental settings (e.g., “Probability of Causation with Sample Selection”)I invited Vitor onto the podcast because of his creative contributions to causal inference, as he fits into a larger informal series I’ve been for the last several years on causal inference in general. In today’s conversation, we talk about Vitor’s path from Brazil to Yale University and then back. Vitor, thank you so much for joining us.Scott's Mixtape Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe

Welcome to The Mixtape with Scott, a podcast dedicated to exploring the personal stories of living economists. I'm your host, Scott Cunningham, Professor of Economics at Baylor University.Today, I'm delighted to introduce Jessica Brown, Assistant Professor of Economics at the Darla Moore School of Business at the University of South Carolina. Jessica is also a Research Fellow at IZA and a Faculty Affiliate at the Wilson-Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities.I invited Jessica onto the podcast because of her deep connections to the credibility revolution, causal inference, and the esteemed tradition of labor economics nurtured at Princeton University’s Industrial Relations Section, where she completed her PhD in 2019.Jessica is also joining us as part of a special series I've been hosting, loosely titled "The Students Of..." Within this series, she specifically contributes to our "Students of Alan Krueger" mini-series. Alan Krueger, a pioneering economist whose work profoundly shaped labor economics, tragically passed away in 2019. Jessica was one of Alan's last doctoral students, and his death came shortly before her dissertation defense.In our conversation today, we'll explore Jessica's journey as an economist, her experiences studying under Alan Krueger, and the influence he had on her professional and personal development.Jessica, thank you so much for joining us.Scott's Mixtape Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Scott's Mixtape Substack at causalinf.substack.com/subscribe