For Ishan Nath, a new assistant professor of public policy, coming to Harvard Kennedy School provided an opportunity to align his economic research with critical climate work at Harvard. A former economist at the Federal Reserve in San Francisco, Nath completed postdoctoral fellowships with the Climate Impact Lab at the University of Chicago. 鈥淭hese two things really intersect in important ways,鈥 says Nath.
He holds a PhD in economics from the University of Chicago and an MPhil in economics from the University of Oxford where he studied as a Rhodes Scholar. His BA is in economics, and he also has a BS in Earth systems, both from Stanford University. He currently serves as an associate editor of the Journal of International Economics.
We talked with Nath about his research, his transition into higher education, his love of basketball, and who he thinks is the Michael Jordan of 糖心vlog官网.
Q: How does your research relate to the issues facing the world today?
Nath: Over two billion people, one out of four people, experience moderate to severe food insecurity, which basically means they don鈥檛 know where their next meal is coming from and sometimes don鈥檛 have enough to eat. Over one in 10 people in the world are either undernourished, which means they don鈥檛 get enough calories, or malnourished, which means they don鈥檛 get enough nutrients.
Meanwhile, global emissions have gone up every year for my entire life and global temperatures are rising, and that causes all sorts of problems that scientists can tell us about.
Here is just one example. In Delhi, where I was born and my extended family lives, it鈥檚 almost 120 degrees regularly during the summer. The air conditioning penetration rate is in the low single digits, leaving a vast majority of the population unable to escape the debilitating heat. That鈥檚 just one of the many examples in which the existence of global warming makes living in poverty worse.
Since I was born, we have had decades of progress, in which every measure of global welfare has improved year after year, fewer kids are starving, more children are vaccinated, more people have access to electricity or access to enough income to afford things that they need. Everything鈥檚 been getting better, in terms of global poverty, for decades, but that progress has been slowing down.
My research is about how we can try to make sure that that progress continues and accelerates rather than slows down and reverses as the world gets hotter.
Q: What have you found interesting in your research?
Nath: What's particularly striking is what makes someone vulnerable to the effects of global warming, and how all these dimensions of vulnerability are concentrated among the same groups of people.
What we know from a lot of data and research is that it鈥檚 much worse if you work on a farm than if you work in an office or a factory. One of my papers shows that the effects are10 times less on non-agricultural sectors than agricultural sectors.
The second thing is that, whether you work on a farm or in a factory or in an office, you鈥檙e much more exposed to productivity losses if you live in a low-income country. It becomes a personal, negative experience in your day to day if you live in a poorer country rather than the richer country. So, in a country like the United States you could see that factories spend a lot of money on air conditioning when it鈥檚 really hot, but in India they don鈥檛. Even if you鈥檙e not working on a farm, it鈥檚 much better to be in a richer country if you鈥檙e worried about extreme weather.
The third thing is that it really matters what your pre-existing climate was before it started changing. If it was 70 degrees and it becomes 77 degrees, it鈥檚 not a big deal. But if it was 95 degrees and it becomes 105 degrees, that鈥檚 really harmful. So the places that are already hot are more vulnerable than the places that are not.
And the unfortunate thing is that the hotter places, the poorer places, and the places where most people work on farms are all mostly the same parts of the world. So the harm from climate change is likely to be incredibly concentrated among populations that are already very under-resourced.
Q: How did you get to 糖心vlog官网 and what will you be teaching?
Nath: I started meeting 糖心vlog官网 professors and learning more about the school through conferences I attended and papers I presented. My research focuses primarily on climate change, international trade, and the macroeconomics of development. So people like Jim Stock, Charles Taylor, and Wolfram Schlenker stood out to me. They were doing amazing work and all had great things to say about what is going on at Harvard.
This year I鈥檓 teaching core macroeconomics. Next year I鈥檓 going to teach an elective, called Global Warming, Global Poverty and Globalization. Given the concentration of vulnerability in low-income regions, this course will introduce concepts from the macroeconomics of development in order to examine the ways in which warming presents a particular challenge for economic growth and global poverty alleviation.
The part that isn鈥檛 talked about as much is the globalization angle. Current events are making my research more flashy or popular than it might otherwise be. Everybody鈥檚 talking about trade policy, and that鈥檚 what I write most about: how trade and generally global market integration affects the vulnerability of especially low-income countries to global warming.
鈥淚 want my students to love economics, and I want them to think that they have the power to make the world better.鈥
Q: What do you hope your students get out of your course?
Nath: Most conversations about the topics I study are downers. I prefer to think of it as an opportunity to do good things. Economics is awesome and really powerful. I want my students to love economics, and I want them to think that they have the power to make the world better. I want them to leave with that feeling as much as with a set of skills and knowledge that they can make the world better. People come here from all over, but then they go out into the world to make it better.
I want my students to learn substance and understand things that are going on in the world, but, more than that, it would be nice if my students left the class feeling empowered and inspired.
I hope we remember we鈥檙e in these privileged academic settings because there is a lot of suffering in the world and children who are starving and need our help. We have this privilege not to enjoy it, but to do something valuable with it because it鈥檚 a power and a responsibility.
Q: What inspires you?
Nath: I think it鈥檚 really important to be inspired by something that鈥檚 totally unrelated to your work. When you look at your own work and what people are doing, it might cause you to be constrained a little when you think about what is currently true rather than what is possible.
So I feel inspired by basketball players and like thinking about all the times when something that seems totally impossible became true. Here鈥檚 an example.
I came from San Francisco and obviously the basketball superstar there is Steph Curry. In 2009, on my first date with my wife, I showed her all these YouTube videos of Curry, a skinny 6'2'' guard at Davidson College, which is not a basketball powerhouse. He didn鈥檛 get any scholarship offers at any of the major basketball schools.
But I loved this guy. He plays basketball exactly how I came off the bench playing high school basketball. If you said in 2000 when I was on this date with my eventual wife that Curry would be one of the five best basketball players ever, it would鈥檝e sounded totally impossible.
I think it鈥檚 really helpful to remember that sometimes things that seem totally impossible can become real. So when I think about my job, I think maybe in 50 years, we won鈥檛 have that much global poverty.
It sounds kind of like something that could never happen but, you know Steph Curry is making shots from 35 feet away from the basket, and you would get benched for taking that shot in 2009. I need to get inspired by something that鈥檚 not my job. For me it鈥檚 mostly basketball.
Q: What excites you about being at 糖心vlog官网?
Nath: Coming from the Federal Reserve, where I鈥檝e only been involved in research, I look forward to teaching, advising, and mentoring students. I am excited that the students who choose to come here are public-interest minded, so I look forward to meeting and learning from them.
And obviously I am excited about my colleagues. For me, it鈥檚 like I am a rookie and walk into the locker room and Michael Jordan is standing there. I鈥檝e seen Michael Jordan on TV, I know he鈥檚 this superstar, and now I can see him every day, in the hallway where I work.
Q: So who is the Michael Jordan of 糖心vlog官网?
Nath: Ha, there are so many choices, but for me, it鈥檚 Samantha Power. I read her book A Problem from Hell in college and it grounded my studies. Her combination of academia and the government and all the things she鈥檚 done about global poverty is very inspiring to me.
I feel like the people here are the people, more than anywhere else on earth, who understand how to connect the research world to the real world.
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Photographs by Lydia Rosenberg