Carlos Díaz

I am an Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at Universidad Alberto Hurtado (Santiago de Chile).

I am also an Associate Researcher at the Centro de Estudios Justicia & Sociedad (Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile) and the Centro Interdisciplinar de Políticas Públicas (Universidad Alberto Hurtado).

In addition, I currently serve as Principal Investigator of two research projects funded by ANID (Chile): the Fondecyt Initiation Grant (2025–2028) “People on the Street and Crime in Santiago”, and the Millennium Nucleus on Criminal Complexity (2024–2027).

I have been in academia since 2018. Before joining Universidad Alberto Hurtado, I served as Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Social Sciences at Universidad Católica del Uruguay until 2023. I earned a PhD in Economics from the Maxwell School of Syracuse University.

During Spring 2027, I will join the Rutgers School of Criminal Justice as a Ronald V. Clarke Fellow.

My research interests lie in quantitative criminology, urban economics, applied methods, and networks.

Publications

Crime in transit: bus stop crowding and crime

Crime Science, S.I.: 50th Anniversary of Crime as Opportunity (2026): Forthcoming

(with F. Fernández*, S. Fossati and N. Trajtenberg) [SSRN WP]

Low-rank bilinear autoregressive models for three-way criminal activity tensors

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C: Applied Statistics (2026)

(with G. Zens, D. Durante and E. Patacchini) [arXiv] [Slides]

When 'eyes on the street' are not enough: insights from itinerant street markets

Journal of Quantitative Criminology 42 (2026): 141-169

(with S. Fossati and N. Trajtenberg) [SSRN WP] [Slides]

Randomization inference for before-and-after studies with multiple units: an application to a criminal procedure reform in Uruguay

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A: Statistics in Society (2025): 1-20

(with M. Cattaneo and R. Titiunik) [arXiv] [GitHub]

The impact of violence on economic growth: evidence from Colombia’s armed conflict

Defence and Peace Economics (2025): 1-30

(with J. Orozco*) [SSRN WP]

The heterogeneous effects of COVID-19 lockdowns on crime across the world

Crime Science 13, No. 22 (2024)

(with N. Trajtenberg, S. Fossati, [...] and M.P. Eisner) [Replication Files] [GitHub]

Parents, neighbors and youth crime

Review of Economics of the Household 21 (2023): 673-692

(with E. Patacchini) [SSRN WP] [IZA DP]

Stay at home if you can: COVID-19 stay-at-home guidelines and local crime

Journal of Empirical Legal Studies 19, No. 4 (2022): 1067-1113

(with S. Fossati and N. Trajtenberg) [SSRN WP]

Can OLPC reduce digital inequalities? ICT household access patterns under Plan Ceibal

Telecommunications Policy 46, No. 4 (2022): 102406

(with M. Dodel and P. Menese) [SSRN WP]

Leaders in juvenile crime

Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 192 (2021): 638-667

(with E. Patacchini, T. Verdier and Y. Zenou) [CEPR DP] [IZA DP] [VoxEU] [Brookings Blog]

A global analysis of the impact of COVID-19 stay-at-home restrictions on crime

Nature Human Behaviour 5, No. 7 (2021): 868-877

(with A.E. Nivette, R. Zahnow, [...] and M.P. Eisner) [Open Access] [Project] [Replication Dataset] [Media]

Social interactions in health behaviors and conditions

Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Economics and Finance (2019)

(with A. Balsa) [Oxford Encyclopedia of Health Economics] [RedUM]

Self-control and peer groups: an empirical analysis

Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 134 (2017): 240-254

(with M. Battaglini and E. Patacchini) [CEPR DP] [VoxEU]

* Graduate student under my supervision.

Ongoing Research

Specialized prosecution and organized crime: quasi-experimental evidence from Chile

(with U. Figueroa, V. Osorio and M. Sylleros) [Working Paper]

The limits of ‘eyes on the street’: a threshold in the surveillance-opportunity trade-off

(with F. Fernández*, S. Fossati and N. Trajtenberg) [Working Paper]

Seeing red: the cost of punishment in the FIFA World Cup

(with E. Choque*, F. Fernández*, S. Fossati and A. Surco*) [Coming Soon]

Unveiling hardships beyond the poverty line: a matching methods approach

(with F. Betancor*) [Working Paper]

Missing headlines, missing deterrence: media absence and crime reporting

(with B. Boggiano and T. Rodríguez*) [Coming Soon]

Reducing crime without the police? Evidence from a place-based infrastructure intervention in Bogotá

(with I. Sarmiento-Barbieri, M. Weintraub and O. Sarmiento) [Coming Soon]

Partners or partisans: unraveling the nexus of political alignment and police engagement in the FBI's UCR program

(with D. Buil-Gil, P. Ezquerra, S. Fossati and N. Trajtenberg)

Street grids and crime: evidence from New York City

(with E. Choque* and J. Urrego)

Crime in America

(with S. Fossati and N. Trajtenberg)

Fellowships, Grants, and Scholarships

Ron V. Clarke Visiting Scholar Program - Rutgers University (USA): 2027

Visiting Scholar (Fellow)

Fondecyt (Initiation Level, 11251057) - ANID (Chile): 2025-2028

Principal Investigator

Millennium Nucleus on Criminal Complexity (NCS2024_058) - ANID (Chile): 2024-2027

Principal Investigator

National System of Researchers (SNI) - ANII (Uruguay): 2024-2027

Associate Researcher (Level I, without Funding)

Fondo Sectorial on Citizen Security - ANII (Uruguay): 2022-2024

Principal Investigator

National System of Researchers (SNI) - ANII (Uruguay): 2018-2023

Active Researcher (Initiation Level, with Funding)

Graduate Student Scholarship - Syracuse University (USA): 2012-2017

Graduate Student

Maxwell Dean’s Summer Assistantship - Syracuse University (USA): 2013

Graduate Student

Graduate Student Scholarship - Washington University in St. Louis (USA): 2010-2012

Graduate Student

Grant for Graduate Studies in the USA - Fulbright Program (USA): 2009

Graduate Student (Declined)

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