Rafael M. Di Tella

I received my first degree in Economics in 1990 from the Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina and a D.Phil in Economics from Oxford University in 1996. After a short stay in Argentina I joined Harvard Business School in July 1997, where I have taught Business History and courses on the business environment in the first year required curriculum, as well as an elective course on Institutions and Macroeconomics in the second year.

I work on political economy, with a focus on institutional development. One strand of work studies measures of happiness and how they can inform government policies on issues that range from the incidence of inequality to the inflation-unemployment tradeoff. Another part of my research has concerned itself with the causes of illegal behavior, with applications to corruption and crime. Two recent examples include a paper on media bias and government transfers, and another trying to figure out if offenders released from electronic monitoring have lower recidvism rates than those released from prison.  Finally, an increasingly important area of research for me has focused on the role of beliefs in economic organization, including reversals of pro-market reform and, more generally, why doesn't capitalism flow to poor countries. My work has been published mainly in academic journals.