Research Assistant (CAGE) (111746-0626)

Informal Queries

• For informal queries about the role, please contact Amrita Kulka (Assistant Professor) at Amrita.Kulka@warwick.ac.uk.

CAGE is an established research centre based in the Department of Economics at the University of Warwick, and has recently been awarded £7.1 million by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to continue its research programme for the next five years

Project: UK Housing and Planning System

The Co-leaders of this project are Dr Nikhil Datta and Dr Amrita Kulka, both assistant professors at the Department of Economics at the University of Warwick, undertaking research to generate rigorous quantitative evidence related to planning in the UK, develop policy recommendations, and communicate findings transparently to policy, media and civil society stakeholders. In the face of plummeting housing affordability in the UK, the overall project examines several dimensions of the UK housing and planning system, with several sub-projects addressing different policy-relevant questions.

As a Research Assistant, you will undertake research to contribute to and support the work of Dr Datta and Dr Kulka.

This job includes a variety of tasks providing excellent preparation for doctoral programmes in applied economics or a career in quantitative analysis of public policies. The role will primarily involve quantitative analysis of our newly constructed data on planning documents combined with data on housing construction, search and price information from a housing search platform, banking and credit card data, and other data that vary depending on the focus of a given sub-project. You will also be learning how to work with Big Data through cleaning, processing, and validation, as well as combining data from various sources. Additionally, you will contribute to developing research designs, preparing presentations for a variety of audiences (academic to policy-oriented), and drafting academic research papers.

About You  

We require an individual who has an interest in the research area, who is pro-active and willing to work as part of a team. The Research Assistant will be expected to assist with the construction, cleaning, manipulating and analysis of Big Data. They will also conduct reviews of existing literature, datasets, and policy documents and work closely with Dr Kulka and Dr Datta throughout to disseminate project outcomes and draft presentations, reports, and academic papers.

You will have completed a masters degree in Economics by the start date. In exceptional cases we might consider a candidate with a completed bachelors degree.