Alessandra Voena

Alessandra Voena is a labour and development economist whose research focuses primarily on the economics of the family and the economics of science and innovation. Her most recent work studies the economic consequences of the cultural norms around marriage on human capital investments in Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. She is currently an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago, a Research Affiliate at CEPR and a faculty research fellow at NBER. She served as a Ruffolo Post-Doctoral Fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School. Voena received a PhD in economics in 2011 from Stanford University and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Torino in Italy in 2005. She was awarded a Sloan Research Fellowship in 2017 and the Carlo Alberto Medal in the same year.