S.K. Ritadhi is an applied microeconomist whose research interests lie at the intersection of development and finance. His current research studies affirmative action for religious minorities in credit markets, and how globalization shocks affect ethnic politics.
He comes to Occidental from Ashoka University. He earned his Ph.D. in agricultural and resource economics from UC Berkeley, and his B.A. in economics from Grinnell College. Prior to his teaching career, Ritadhi worked as a research economist at India’s central bank, the Reserve Bank of India.
What drew you to teach at Occidental?
I have enjoyed the structure of a liberal arts college as it allows me to strike a balance between research and teaching. The classroom gives me a space to express my ideas, share aspects of my research, and offer students insights into various topics and sub-disciplines in the world of economics. In liberal arts colleges, smaller class sizes allow me to engage directly with students and foster a more participatory learning environment. Among liberal arts college, what stood out to me about Oxy was the large diversity in its student body, and also the large share of students on financial aid. I strongly believe in making the classrooms more inclusive spaces and was drawn to Oxy's support for students on financial aid.
With a full semester behind you, what are your impressions of Oxy students?
I think I really appreciate the disciplined manner in which students at Oxy attend classes, and are quite responsive to classroom discussions. I like to see a full classroom and greatly enjoy classroom engagement. The first couple of semesters has gone pretty well in this regard. I have also learned that Oxy students are really good at pacing themselves through the semester. The amount of catching up I have seen students do prior to a mid-term is quite remarkable!
When did you first become interested in development and finance?
My interest in the discipline of economics, and development economics in particular, emerged during the 2004 federal elections in India. The incumbent party tried to highlight India's GDP growth and launched a campaign, pompously titled India Shining, and subsequently lost. The loss was to a left-liberal coalition which called for greater inclusivity in the growth process. This dichotomy between aggregate growth, citizens participation in the growth process, poverty and inequality, and how they manifested through the electoral process was my primary attraction to the field of economics.
The move towards finance is a bit amusing – my first job after my PhD was as a research economist in India's central bank. They had some proprietary data and needed someone who could code to work with the data. When I was offered to work with the data, I said yes, but also told that I could count on my fingers the number of finance and banking papers I had read. The central bank chair said the finance is easy to learn, coding up the data and analyzing it in Stata was apparently much harder! Trying to find research questions using the proprietary data got me into the space at the intersection of development and finance!
Do you have a favorite class that you are teaching, and why?
My favorite class would be econometrics. It is probably one of the most important and useful courses in the major, given the increasing value of data analysis in the "real world''. It is a challenging course to teach as it introduces students to a new methodology but I greatly enjoy the responsibility of offering students a completely new approach with which to analyze questions in the world of economics.