Karthik Sastry

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Assistant Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University

I am an Assistant Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University, in the Department of Economics and the School for Public and International Affairs.

I study macroeconomics. Two specific themes in my work are understanding the role of bounded rationality and social dynamics in business-cycle fluctuations and modeling how societies adapt to climate change through policy changes and technological innovation.

I received a PhD in Economics from MIT in 2022 and I was a Prize Fellow in Economics, History, and Politics at Harvard University in the 2022-23 academic year. My full CV can be found here. You can contact me at ksastry@princeton.edu.

Working Papers

“Attention Cycles,” with Joel P. Flynn. Revise and resubmit, American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics. Paper, SSRN Link. May 2024.

“Disagreement About Monetary Policy.” Revise and resubmit, American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics. Paper, SSRN Link. September 2024.

“Food Policy in a Warming World” with Allan Hsiao and Jacob Moscona. Revise and resubmit, Econometrica. Paper. Vox Dev Summary. Coverage: Diario Financiero (Chile). May 2024.

“How Much Should We Trust Regional-Exposure Designs?” with Jeremy Majerovitz. Paper. SSRN Link. November 2023.

“Inappropriate Technology: Evidence from Global Agriculture,” with Jacob Moscona. Revise and resubmit, American Economic Review. Paper, SSRN Link. Vox Dev Summary. Coverage: Econimate, Project Syndicate. November 2022.

“The Macroeconomics of Narratives,” with Joel P. Flynn. Paper, SSRN Link. Vox EU Summary. June 2024.

“Optimally Coarse Contracts,” with Roberto Corrao and Joel P. Flynn. Paper. SSRN Link. November 2023.

“A Theory of Supply Function Choice and Aggregate Supply,” with Joel P. Flynn and Georgios Nikolakoudis. Revise and resubmit, American Economic Review. Paper, SSRN Link, Older WP on Prices vs. Quantities with Additional Results. April 2024.

Publications and Forthcoming Articles

“Inattentive Economies,” with George-Marios Angeletos. Accepted, Journal of Political Economy. Paper, NBER Link. February 2024.

“Strategic Mistakes,” with Joel P. Flynn. Journal of Economic Theory, 2023, (212). Publisher’s Link, Paper, SSRN Link.

“Does Directed Innovation Mitigate Climate Damage? Evidence from US Agriculture,” with Jacob Moscona. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2023, 138(2): 637-701. Publisher’s Link, Paper, Online Appendix, SSRN Link. Coverage: Harvard Gazette, Nature Climate Change Research Highlight.

“Nonlinear Pricing with Under-Utilization: A Theory of Multi-Part Tariffs,” with Roberto Corrao and Joel P. Flynn. American Economic Review, 2023, 113(3): 836-860. Publisher’s Link, Paper, SSRN Link.

“Managing Expectations: Instruments vs. Targets,” with George-Marios Angeletos. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2021, 136(4): 2467–2532. Publisher’s Link, Paper.

“Imperfect Macroeconomic Expectations: Evidence and Theory,” with George-Marios Angeletos and Zhen Huo. NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2020, 35: 1-86. Publisher’s Link, Paper.

“Feedbacks: Financial Markets and Economic Activity,” with Markus Brunnermeier, Darius Palia, and Christopher A. Sims. American Economic Review, 2021, 111(6): 1845-1879. Publisher’s Link, Paper, Online Appendix.