Hi there! Welcome to my website.
My name is Wei Zhang (张巍). You can hear how to pronounce my name here .
I am currently a PhD candidate in Economics at Purdue University. My research lies at the intersection of econometrics and macroeconomics, with a focus on dynamic factor models and large Bayesian VARs. I’m particularly interested in how these tools can be used for forecasting, structural analysis, business cycle monitoring, and tackling missing data challenges in high-dimensional datasets.
Before Purdue, I completed my master’s degree at Humboldt University of Berlin, where I focused on causal inference under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Bernd Fitzenberger. My master’s thesis used China’s 1998 college enrollment expansion as an instrument to estimate the effects of education on the wage distribution in urban areas via instrumental quantile regression.
I expect to graduate in August 2025. After that, I’m thrilled to be joining Prof. Domenico Giannone on a set of exciting research projects that push the frontier of empirical macroeconomics.
Outside of research, I love painting and playing the piano. I’m also a nature-lover — many of my best research ideas have come to me while on the trail. Feel free to check out this link for a few snapshots from my nature adventures!
You’ll find my CV below.
EDUCATION
- Ph.D., Economics, Purdue University, 2025 (Expected)
- M.S., Economics, Humboldt University of Berlin, 2017
- M.A., Economics, University of International Business and Economics, 2017
- B.A., International Business, Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, 2014
SKILLS
- Programming Language: R, MATLAB, Python
- Languages: Chinese (native), English (Fluent), Japanese (beginner), German (beginner).
GRANTS & AWARDS
- Purdue: Doctoral Student Research Fund, 2024; Summer Research Grant 2022, 2024; Federick N. Andrews Fellowship, 2019, 2020
- UIBE: Graduate Student Scholarship, 2014, 2015
- ZUEL: Excellent Graduate of Class 2014; National Scholarship, 2013.