Education

I was a little kid when Venezuela suffered a coup d'état in 1992. Looking at the difficulties endured by the Venezuelan families and all the socio-economic changes related to this event makes me wonder about the most basic origin of such turmoil. News and history suggest that the political instability that led to the putsch was born in a context of social inequality, corruption, and inefficient public policies in education and welfare for what was considered marginal groups of society. Soon, I realized that I first needed to understand basic concepts of social interactions and economic systems. As a result, I decided to pursue a bachelor’s degree in social science, becoming an Economist.

Some years later, the same desire guided my decisions of working with a local government (Chacao Municipality) in Venezuela and the United Nations in Chile, and study for a Master’s degree in Public Policy (MPP) at the University of Chile with a focus on social policies and impact evaluation.

During the discussions about inequality, poverty, challenges of the middle class, and social security in Chile, with different actors -government, academic, and international consultants- there were transversal factors to these problems: labor market inequalities and rigidities. These features are responsible for low wages, precarious work, vulnerability, lack of health coverage, and meager pension benefits.

It triggered my desire to understand the complex and multidimensional dynamics that shape the labor market and its social outcomes, so I pursued a Master of Industrial and Labor Relations focused on Labor Market Policy at Cornell University.