Sam Asher

Sam Asher is Assistant Professor of International Economics
at Johns Hopkins SAIS and cofounder of Development
Data Lab. Development Data Lab works with governments,
firms, and civil society organizations to generate policyrelevant
knowledge from their underused data. Asher’s
research seeks to understand the microeconomic
determinants of economic growth, urbanization, and
economic opportunity for the poor.

Together with Paul Novosad, he has built a high spatial
resolution data platform and new analytic tools to analyze
economic development at the local level in India. Current
projects are examining the causes and consequences of
educational mobility, segregation, and frictions preventing
workers from moving to greater opportunities across
India’s 600,000 towns and villages.