Assistant Professor of Economics
- PhD, University of California Davis, Agricultural and Resource Economics
- MS, Universidad de Los Andes, Colombia, Economics
- BA, Universidad de Los Andes, Colombia, Economics
Karen Ortiz-Becerra is an assistant professor of economics at the Knauss School of Business at the University of San Diego. She holds a PhD in agricultural and resource economics from the University of California Davis and an M.S. in economics from the Universidad de Los Andes in Colombia. Prior to her doctoral studies, she worked at the Inter-American Development Bank and the World Bank’s Office of the Chief Economist for Latin America Caribbean region in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Ortiz’s research examines the impacts of policies and technological innovations on local economies, with a special focus on employment, structural transformation, and welfare. She is passionate about studying policies that lead to economic development that is socially and environmentally sustainable. She also studies questions on the econometrics of impact evaluation and has co-developed new methods to test and correct for attrition bias in empirical studies. This research has been featured in the World Bank’s Development Impact blog.
Karen is passionate about teaching and mentoring students from diverse backgrounds. She strives at designing and leading courses that help transform knowledge into skills that can be applied beyond the classroom. She has taught courses in labor, development economics, and econometrics, and will be teaching statistics for business and economics in the fall.
Selected Publications
- Colina, A., Vosti, S., Jarvis, M., Engle-Stone, R., Michuda, A., Ortiz-Becerra, K., Adams, K. (2025) Cost-Effectiveness of Fortified Bouillon in Addressing Burkinabe Children’s Vitamin A Inadequacy: An Economic Optimization Model, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1544(1), 143-158.
- Ortiz-Becerra, K., Ghanem, D., Hirshleifer, S., Kédagni, D. (2024) Correcting Attrition Bias using Changes-in-Changes, Journal of Econometrics, 241(2), 105737.
- Vosti, S., Adams, K., Michuda, A., Ortiz-Becerra, K., Luo, H., Haile, D., Chou, V., Clermont, A., Teta, I., Ndjebayi, A., Kagin, J., Guintang, J., Engle-Stone, R. (2023) Impacts of Micronutrient Intervention Programs on Effective Coverage and Lives Saved: Modeled Evidence from Cameroon., Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1519(1), 199-210.
- Ortiz-Becerra, K., Ghanem, D., Hirshleifer, S. (2023) Testing Attrition Bias in Field Experiments, Journal of Human Resources, Advance online publication.