David Qihang Wu

David Wu is completing a PhD in Economics at the University of California, Berkeley, and will be graduating in May 2024.  David’s research interests include labor market frictions faced by firms in developing countries, and the cultural impact of large Chinese firms on workers in sub-Saharan African countries. Combining causal inference techniques and extensive fieldwork in Ethiopia, he plans to provide a micro-founded understanding of the “soft-power” impact of China in developing countries where foreign investment from China has increased rapidly over the past decades.

Research interests: firms in developing countries, labor market frictions, hiring, structural transformation, political economy, culture