Hi, I'm
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I'm a software and data engineer based in the Bay Area. By day, I write software, build systems, analyze data, and design tools. By night, I read books, mostly economics, philosophy, and literature. Occasionally I write or make things for the internet.
I am actively looking for new work opportunities right now. Reach out at the links below if you are interested!
About Me
Running
Ramping back up into training mode currently. I’m looking forward to improving my 800m, mile, 5K, and 10K times before my fast twitch muscle fiber deteriorates any more than it already has.
Woodworking
I like making things out of wood, especially with hand tools. Working on lots of little home-improvement and configuration projects.
Cooking
I enjoy learning about the art and science of cooking and applying it in my kitchen. I love cooking food with and for my friends and playing with different cuisines, flavors, and methods.
Lindy Hop
I started dancing at Lindy on Sproul at UC Berkeley in 2019. I love the dance, the music, and the community of people it brings out! Always working on developing more musicality and refining my leading and following technique.
Games
I’m a regular player of Terraforming Mars, Arcs, Flamecraft, Root, Wingspan, and other tabletop games with friends. Games encode, stabilize, and transmit special kinds of shared experiences of agency in a magical and delightful way.
学中文
我在学习中文。现在我的词汇不多，语法也很基础，但在慢慢积累。
Open-mindedness, Curiosity, and Experimentation
Surprise and discovery are delightful
- Not minimizing surprise.
Collaboration, Conversation, and Diversity
Bringing people to build things makes them better. Clear communication, respect, patience, and empathy with my collaborators.
Playfulness, curisosity, and experimentation
We learn best by pushing against the boundaries and trying things that might (and probably will) fail. Play enables us to throw off constraints, question assumptions, and be creative.
Groundedness
Work, society, and the economy to serve people and the planet. Abstractions matter, but not as much as people do. It’s easy to get lost up in the clouds or down in the weeds when we’re working hard on something. Keeping a clear focus on the goals of the work I’m doing and the tangible benefits that achieving those goals will confer ensures that I’m making a meaningful and impactful contribution in the world.
People
- Writing: Thoughtful, cross-displinary technical and non-technical writing.
- Project Management: Project management, delegation, and prioritization honed across diverse project environments
- Teaching: Teaching and mentoring focused on developing conceptual understanding and building confidence to solve problems independently.
Technology
- Backend & systems: Design and implementation of backend systems in Python and Go, with attention to correctness, performance, and operational simplicity.
- Infrastructure & automation: Provisioning and operating Linux-based infrastructure for self-hosted services and websites, including environment setup, service supervision, deployment automation, and routine maintenance. Comfortable with shell scripting, CI/CD workflows, and reproducible system configuration.
- Web engineering: Building web interfaces and applications with TypeScript, JavaScript, React, and modern HTML/CSS, with a bias toward clarity and maintainability over frameworks.
- ML/AI: Practical ML and deep learning in Python (PyTorch, NumPy), from data preparation to model evaluation.
- Mathematical foundations: Fluency and rigor in linear algebra, probability theory, real analysis, and algorithms.
- Data & economic analysis: Quantitative analysis in Python, R, and Stata, with a focus on economic data, causal reasoning, and measurement.
Relational
- Open-mindedness: Surprise, uncertainty, and discovery are delightful and to be sought out.
- Collaboration and Conversation: Bringing people together to build things makes better things. Clear communication, respect, kindness, patience, and empathy are foundational for bringing people together. The best ideas are discovered and honed in conversation.
- Groundedness: Work, society, and the economy exist in service to people and the planet. Abstractions matter, but not as much as creatures and things do.
Personal
- Curiosity: People and things are interesting. Noticing what’s interesting feels good and connects us to our world.
- Experimentation: The world in which we’re embedded is a complicated, messy place best learned about by trying things in it. Practicality protects prettiness from itelf.
- Persistence: Working hard over long stretches and through difficult periods is how excellent things get built.
Projects
SSPI Full Stack Web Application
Software and Data Engineer
- Led a complete redesign of the SSPI database, data collection procedures, and data validation processes
- Implemented a full stack web application for data collection, management, and validation which compiles data from dozens of reporting sources, seamlessly handles different formats, and allows automatic validation procedures that ensure the local SSPI database is correct and up-to-date
- Database improvements have cut manual data entry and validation time by an order of magnitude, removing a major project bottleneck
- Led four undergraduates through their first software and data engineering project by creating tutorials and offering mentoring sessions for tools like git, GitHub, Python, Flask, SQL, and MongoDB
Sustainable and Shared Prosperity Index (SSPI)
Economic Research - Lead Research Analyst and Project Manager
- Created an index that scores and ranks national policies across Sustainability, Market Structure, and Public Goods for 49 countries
- Led 12 undergraduates in data collection and policy research to engineer over 50 data-driven policy indicators
- Conducted sensitivity testing to ensure the robustness of indicators and aggregation methodology
- Assessed the extent to which the SSPI policy index tracks performance metrics using regression analysis
Do Homeowners Care About Air Quality? Evidence from Wildfire Smoke
Economic Research - Original Working Paper
- Implemented a causal regression analysis design in R to evaluate the effect of negative air quality shocks on housing prices
- Matched geospatial wildfire smoke data from NOAA (~28,000,000 observations) to housing price data from Zillow (~98,000 observations) at the US county-month level and salient control variables to synthesize a novel dataset for model estimation
- Accounted for spatial autocorrelation of observations to reduce omitted variable bias and generate plausibly causal estimates
Something in the Air: How Policy Affects Air Quality
Economic Research - Original Working Paper
- Scraped HTML and JSON data from the web using Python’s xpath library to construct a 60,000 observation dataset on country level policy on air quality across the OECD
- Developed a novel theoretical model for separately estimating the effect of policy on different pathways for the reduction of air pollution
- Conducted a time series regression analysis of the relationship between air quality policy data and air quality outcomes in R to assess the kinds of policies which are most effective at reducing air pollution