Virginia Zhang

Virginia Zhang is an assistant policy researcher at RAND and a Ph.D. student in the Research, Analysis, and Design stream at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. She has a B.A. in economics and sociology from New York University.

Prior to joining Pardee RAND, she was as a research assistant at Harvard University, where she conducted quasi-experimental studies on the patient health impacts of Medicare Advantage. She was previously a research assistant at New York University, where she studied topics in U.S. labor market inequality using longitudinal methods. She was also a research assistant at the NYU Marron Institute of Urban Management, where she provided technical assistance for a school-based RCT to improve student outcomes.

Her research interests include labor and public economics, social insurance, workforce development, place-based policies, and program evaluation.