Fernando Rios-Avila

Contact Information

64 Oak Streat • Rensselear, NY, 12144 • (404) 924-5176 • f.rios.a@gmail.com

Summary

PhD economist with over a decade of research experience specializing in labor economics, applied econometrics, and applied microeconomics. Expertise in poverty and inequality analysis, data-driven policy evaluation, econometric modeling, with experience teaching graduate-level courses. Former research scholar at Levy Economicst institute and key contributor to the Levy Institute Measure of Income and Wealth (LIMEW) and the Levy Institute Measure of Time and Income Poverty (LIMTIP).

Research Interests

  • Applied Econometrics: Causal inference, decomposition methods, non-parametric methods
  • Applied Microeconomics: Policy evaluation, consumer behavior
  • Labor Economics: Wage dynamics, union impacts, labor market institutions
  • Poverty and Inequality: Measurement techniques, intersectionality
  • Generative AI: As a tool for data analysis and research.

Education

PhD in Economics | Georgia State University | 2008-2013 Dissertation: “Essays on Unions, Wages, and Performance: Evidence from Latin America”

Advanced Studies (M.Sc) International Economics | Kiel University - Germany | 2007-2008

Licenciatura en Economia (5 yr program, BS equivalent) | Universidad Católica Boliviana | 2000-2004

Professional Experience

Data Analyst 2 | Department of Health at Office of Aging and Long Term Care | January 2025 - Present

  • Worked on analysis focusing on the Nurse Labor shortage in NY.
  • Implementation of various AI-powered Research focus tools.

Research Scholar | Levy Economics Institute of Bard College | August 2013 – December 2024

  • Worked on research projects on labor market dynamics, inequality, and time and income poverty
  • Developed and applied econometric models for the analysis of time use and consumption data.
  • Mantained and updated the Levy Institute Measure of Income and Wealth (LIMEW) and the Levy Institute Measure of Time and Income Poverty (LIMTIP)
  • Primary instructor for econometric courses at the Levy Institute’s Master of Science in Economic Theory and Policy program.

Consultant | World Bank | 2022 - Present

  • Conducted analysis in labor and development economics topics in Latin America.
  • Developed and applied econometric models for analysis of income and consumption data.

Research Assistant | Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta | August 2010 – June 2013

Graduate Research Assistant | Georgia State University | August 2008 – December 2013

Consultant (UNICEF Project) | Economic and Social Policy Analysis Unit (UDAPE) | July 2005 – June 2007

Internship | Superintendence of Hydrocarbon, Financial and Economic Analysis-Department | January 2004 – July 2004

Teaching Experience

Levy Economics Institute

  • Econometrics of Poverty, Inequality and Social Science Research | 2015- 2021
  • Research Methods I: Econometrics | 2018- Present
  • Applied Econometric Methods for Empirical Research & Policy Evaluation | 2023 - Present
  • Research Methods II: Applied Methods in Microeconomics (Shared Course) | 2024- Present
  • Intersecting Inequalities (Shared Course): Labor Market Institutions | 2018
  • Intersecting Inequalities (Shared Course): Decompositions Methods in Economics | 2017

Publications

Refereed Publications

1. Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J., Gomez-Aliaga, Guillermo., Britton, chevanne, Rios-Avila, F., Jimenez-Pozo, W., Granados Ibarra, S., & Li, R. (Forthcoming). Fiscal incidence on the island: Grenada’s fiscal system and its incidence. Accepted for Publication in Social and Economic Studies.
2. Nagengast, A. J., Rios-Avila, F., & Yotov, Y. V. (Forthcoming). The european single market and intra-EU trade: An assessment with heterogeneity-robust difference-in-differences methods. Accepted for Publication in Economica.
3. Rios-Avila, F., Ramos, A., Canavire-Bacarreza, G., & Siles, L. (Forthcoming). Estimation of quantile regressions with fixed effects. Accepted for Publication in Stata Journal.
4. Morrar, R., Hinn, H., & Rios-Avila, F. (2025). Persistent gender disparities in financial inclusion in palestine after COVID-19 pandemic. Development Studies Research, 12(1), 2546339. https://doi.org/10.1080/21665095.2025.2546339
5. Rios-Avila, F., Özekin, A., & Komuryakan, F. (2025). Glass ceiling, sticky floor, or both? Public and private sector differences in türkiye. Metroeconomica, 76(1), 122–161. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/meca.12481
6. Hotchkiss, J. L., Moore, R. E., & Rios-Avila, F. (2024). Impact of the 2017 tax cuts and jobs act on household labor supply and welfare across the income distribution. National Tax Journal, 77(2), 313–348.
7. Mundra, K., & Rios-Avila, F. (2024). Education-occupation mismatch and social networks for hispanics in the u.s.: Role of citizenship. Education Economics, 23(2), 185–209.
8. Rios-Avila, F., Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J., & Sacco-Capurro, F. (2024). Recovering income distribution in the presence of interval-censored data. Journal of Economic Inequality. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10888-023-09617-2
9. Jenkins, S. P., & Rios-Avila, F. (2023). Finite mixture model for linked survey and administrative data: Estimation and post estimation. The Stata Journal, 23(1), 53–85.
10. Jenkins, S. P., & Rios-Avila, F. (2023). Reconciling reports: Modeling employment earnings and measurement errors using linked survey and administrative data. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A: Statistics in Society, 186(1), 110–136. https://doi.org/10.1093/jrsssa/qnac003
11. Rios-Avila, F., & Maroto, M. L. (2022). Moving beyond linear regression: Implementing and interpreting quantile regression models with fixed effects. Sociological Methods and Research. https://doi.org/10.1177/0049124121103616
12. Jenkins, S. P., & Rios-Avila, F. (2021). Measurement error in earnings data: Replication of meijer, rohwedder, and wansbeek’s mixture model approach to combining survey and register data. Journal of Applied Econometrics, 1–10.
13. Morrar, R., & Rios-Avila, F. (2021). Discrimination against refugees in the palestinian labor market. International Journal of Manpower, 42(2), 1002–1024.
14. Mundra, K., & Rios-Avila, F. (2021). Using repeated cross-sectional data to examine the role of immigrant birth-country networks on unemployment duration: An application of guell and hu (2006) approach. Empirical Economics, 61, 389–415.
15. Rios-Avila, F. (2021). Estimation of marginal effects for models with alternative variable transformations. The Stata Journal, 21(1), 81–96.
16. Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J., Chong, A., Rios-Avila, F., & Yanez-Pagans, M. (2020). Will elders provide for their grandchildren? Unconditional cash transfers and educational expenditures in bolivia. Review of Development Economics, 24(2), 424–447.
17. Hotchkiss, J. L., Moore, R. E., & Rios-Avila, F. (2020). Cost of policy choices: A microsimulation analysis of the impact on family welfare of unemployment and price changes. Journal of Macroeconomics, 63, 103167.
18. Jenkins, S. P., & Rios-Avila, F. (2020). Modelling errors in survey and administrative data on employment earnings: Sensitivity to the fraction assumed to have error-free earnings. Economics Letters, 192, 109253.
19. Rios-Avila, F. (2020). Recentered influence functions (RIF) in stata: RIF regression and RIF decomposition. Stata Journal, 20(1), 51–94.
20. Rios-Avila, F. (2020). Smooth varying coefficient models in stata. The Stata Journal, 20(3), 647–679.
21. Rios-Avila, F., & Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J. (2020). The effect of immigration on labor market transitions of native-born unemployed in the united states. Journal of Labor Research, 41, 295–331.
22. Masterson, T., Rios-Avila, F., Zacharias, A., & Wolf, E. N. (2019). The great recession and racial inequality: Evidence from measures of economic well-being. Journal of Economic Issues, 53(4), 1048–1069.
23. Rios-Avila, F. (2019). A semi-parametric approach to the oaxaca–blinder decomposition with continuous group variable and self-selection. Econometrics, 7(2), 28.
24. Rios-Avila, F., & Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J. (2018). Standard error correction in two-stage optimization models: A quasi-maximum likelihood estimation approach. The Stata Journal, 18(1), 206–222.
25. Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J., & Rios-Avila, F. (2017). On the determinants of wage inequality changes in urban bolivia. Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, 18(4), 464–496.
26. Hotchkiss, J. L., Moore, R. E., Rios-Avila, F., & Trussel, M. (2017). A tale of two decades: Relative intra-family earning capacity and changes in family welfare over time. Review of Economics of the Household, 15(3), 707–737.
27. Rioja, F. K., Rios-Avila, F., & Valev, N. T. (2017). Productivity during recessions with banking crises: Inter-industry evidence. Economics Letters, 152, 50–53.
28. Rios-Avila, F. (2017). Unions and economic performance in developing countries: Case studies from latin america. Ecos de Economia: A Latin American Journal of Applied Economics, 21(44), 4–36.
29. Saravia, A., Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J., & Rios-Avila, F. (2017). Intellectual property rights, foreign direct investment and economic freedom. Global Economy Journal, 23(2), 20170017.
30. Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J., & Rios-Avila, F. (2016). The effect of intimate partner violence on labor market decisions: Evidence from a multi-ethnic country. International Journal of Social Economics, 44(1), 75–92.
31. Aristizabal-Ramirez, M., Canavire-Bacarreza, G. J., & Rios-Avila, F. (2015). Revisiting the effects of innovation on growth: A threshold analysis. Applied Economics Letters, 22(18), 1474–1479.
32. Hotchkiss, J. L., Moore, R. E., & Rios-Avila, F. (2015). Reevaluation of the employment impact of the 1996 summer olympic games. Southern Economic Journal, 81(3), 619–632.
33. Hotchkiss, J. L., Quispe-Agnoli, M., & Rios-Avila, F. (2015). The wage impact of undocumented workers: Evidence from administrative data. Southern Economic Journal, 81(4), 874–906.
34. Rios-Avila, F. (2015). Feasible estimation of linear models with n-fixed effects. Stata Journal, 15(3), 881–898.
35. Hotchkiss, J. L., Pitts, M., & Rios-Avila, F. (2014). A search for evidence of skill mismatch in the aftermath of the great recession. Applied Economics Letters, 21(9), 587–592.
36. Rioja, F. K., Rios-Avila, F., & Valev, N. T. (2014). Serial banking crises and capital investment. Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, 50(6), 193–208.
37. Rioja, F. K., Rios-Avila, F., & Valev, N. T. (2014). The persistent effect of banking crises on investment and the role of financial markets. Journal of Financial Economic Policy, 6(1), 64–77.
38. Rios-Avila, F., & Hirsch, B. (2014). Unions, wage gaps, and wage dispersion: New evidence from the americas. Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, 53(1), 1–27.
39. Hotchkiss, J. L., & Rios-Avila, F. (2013). Identifying factors behind the decline in the u.s. Labor force participation rate. Business and Economic Research, 3(1).
40. Searing, E. A. M., Rios-Avila, F., & Lecy, J. D. (2013). Mental health and labor market outcomes in bosnia-herzegovina. Social Science & Medicine, 96(20), 165–173.
41. Hotchkiss, J. L., Moore, R. E., & Rios-Avila, F. (2012). Assessing the welfare impact of tax reform: A case study of the 2001 US tax cut. The Review of Income and Wealth, 58(2), 233–256.
42. Mercado-Salazar, A., Leiton, J., & Rios-Avila, F. (2004). Segmentación en el mercado matrimonial. Revista Latinoamericana de Desarrollo Económico, 3, 49–76.

Awards and Honors

  • Journal of Economic Issues, Editor’s Prize, 2019
  • The Stata Journal, Editors’ Prize, 2023

Thesis Advisor

  • María Aristizábal-Ramírez (Undergraduate Thesis)
  • Ian Bowen (Master Thesis)
  • Alejandra Montoya (Master Thesis)
  • Daniella Medina (Master Thesis)
  • Rhett Maiorama (Master Thesis)
  • Esteban Rivera (Master Thesis)
  • Brandon Istenes (Master Thesis)
  • Masooma Hassan (Master Thesis)

Languages and Software

Statistical software with programming experience:

  • Stata: Advanced proficiency, developed and maintained various user-written programs
  • R: Intermediate proficiency, used software for Econometrics classes
  • Python: Intermediate proficiency for programming and basic econometric analysis
  • SQL: Intermediate proficiency for querying large datasets.
  • Basic knowledge of Julia.

Languages:

  • Spanish (Native)
  • English (Fluent)