Karthik Muralidharan
J-PAL Affiliated Professor
Tata Chancellor’s Professor of Economics
University of California, San Diego
Karthik Muralidharan is the Tata Chancellor’s Professor of Economics at the University of California, San Diego. His research focuses on improving education and health in developing countries. He has studied the impact of performance-pay for teachers, the impact of contract teachers, and the impact of cash grants to schools on student learning outcomes in India via large-scale randomized evaluations. Current projects include studying the impact of school choice programs in India, and the impact of teacher certification, across the board salary increases for teachers, and continuous teacher training programs in Indonesia. Karthik earned his PhD from Harvard University.
Karthik served as Co-Chair of J-PAL's Education sector until 2024. He has also served on the review board of J-PAL's Post-Primary Education and Learning for All Initiatives, and as a lecturer at J-PAL training events.