Jae Yeon Kim

This is the updated syllabus for the course Politics of Public Policy that I am teaching this semester:

lnkd.in/euuTcdZX

This little book is still a classic.

Academic friends: do you have grad students working on survey methods questions (ones we can help answer with Survey 160 data)? Please share with them this fellowship opportunity. Applications for first round are closing soon. www.survey160.com/survey-160-r...

DC friends and colleagues: I will be in DC from next Tuesday to Thursday for a short trip. My Wednesday schedule is fully booked, but I may have some time Tuesday evening or Thursday morning or early lunch. If you would like to catch up or reconnect, let me know. Would be great to see you.

I will also expand my research agenda on tech policy, with a focus on how governments buy, use, and scale AI technologies.

During this time, I plan to finish my book manuscript, Unseen and Uncounted, which connects administrative burden with American political development.

I’m very excited to share that I will be on research leave and visiting the Berkeley Economy & Society Initiative, hosted by Paul Pierson, in Spring 2027.

The image features large text saying "JEPS" with smaller text below stating "NEW ISSUE ONLINE" on a dark background.

NEW ISSUE from the Journal of Experimental Political Science -

Volume 13 - Issue 1 - Spring 2026 - https://cup.org/4ktMMtb

w/ papers by @melinscribe.bsky.social, @efrenpolipsy.bsky.social, @kevinaslett.bsky.social, @jatucker.bsky.social, @jaeyeonkim.bsky.social, et al

#OpenAccess

Paths Denied, Paths Created Some memories fade as we grow older; others come into sharper focus.

Resharing what I wrote about my mission (and in memory of my late father) about a year ago. I do research because I care: substack.com/home/post/p-...

Academy Alumni | Consortium on the American Political Economy The annual CAPE Summer Academy is designed to introduce the APE framework, facilitate in-depth discussions around several key areas within APE, and create opportunities for participants to share work ...

"Participating in the CAPE Summer Academy in 2023 was one of the most formative experiences of my graduate training."

Hear from Rebekah Jones, @hrendleman.bsky.social,
@jaeyeonkim.bsky.social, @dannydaneri.bsky.social, @stano.bsky.social and others on what the Summer Academy meant to them!

Policy Is Not a Vending Machine Many political scientists implicitly rely on something like a vending machine model of public policy.

A new Substack essay from me: substack.com/home/post/p-...

Policy is not a vending machine.

The pace at which US wealth concentration is rising is simply staggering

The concentration of AI wealth into the hands of a few tech barons + plutocratic capture ==> unchartered territory

[공익이 이끄는 데이터 과학] 서로를 이해하기 위하여 - 더나은미래 김재연 노스캐롤라이나대 채플힐 정책학과 교수 늦은 밤, 집으로 가는 길이었다.  노스캐롤라이나대 채플힐 캠퍼스가 자리한 채플힐은 조그만 대학 도시다. 이곳 주민들 대부분은 교수나 직원, 학생 등 어떤 식으로든 노스캐롤라이나대(UNC) 채플힐과 연결돼 있다. 듀크대와도

아마도 이번이 마지막 더나은미래 칼럼입니다. 2년 가까이 공익이 이끄는 데이터 과학에 대한 여러 주제를 다룰 수 있어 감사했습니다.

마지막 칼럼의 제목은 "서로를 이해하기 위하여"입니다.

futurechosun.com/archives/143...

This project is really cool.

maps.wsfcsvoices.org

I think I’ve almost left RStudio for Antigravity and Positron. It’s been many good years.

From me: "What Universities Are For."

jaeyeonkim.substack.com/p/what-unive...

jaeyk.github.io/select_valid...

Years ago, I co-developed a database of 600 names with 44,000+ evaluations for experimental studies on race and ethnicity (w/t Charles, Michael, John, and their students). Here's a website that I built to help you use the data more easily and effectively.

Duke friends and colleagues, I will be at Duke throughout the conference except for Thursday afternoon after 2 pm. Please let me know if you are around and would like to catch up or chat.

I will also discuss how states approached procurement, whether individually or through collaborative procurement channels. You will learn the answer in the talk.

We built LLM-based pipelines to analyze a large-scale dataset of actual procurement contracts, studying which terms state governments negotiated for, including responsible AI provisions, and which they did not.

The project focuses on procurement as a policy lever and examines how state governments negotiate contracts with AI vendors.

I am very excited to be part of the Conference on Society-Centered AI next week. In addition to a poster that will be featured at the conference, I will also give a flash talk on Saturday (2/14) on Contracting for Fair AI, joint work with Aniket Kesari.

In the near future, I'm interested in developing courses at the intersection of public policy and data science / AI. Some early ideas are here, and I’d love to hear your thoughts:
jaeyk.github.io/teaching/tea...

With colleagues across academia, industry, and the nonprofit sector, I also wrote about training social scientists with data science skills for both academic and non-academic careers.
tinyurl.com/7rwcrm4b

Even in the era of generative and agentic AI, I still think these foundations matter. They help us give better instructions, evaluate outputs, and debug code produced by AI agents.

I’ve recently fixed a few bugs in my lecture notes on computational methods and tools for social scientists: jaeyk.github.io/comp_thinkin...

College SNAP Project | SNAP Benefits for College Students Find state-specific SNAP benefits information for college students. Learn about eligibility, application processes, and resources to help overcome food insecurity.

I’m working on food insecurity among college students, especially around SNAP. Does anyone know someone at the College SNAP Project?: www.collegesnapproject.org/about

I’ve been experimenting with Claude to improve my personal homepage. Not bad.: jaeyk.github.io

Six principles that reshaped how I think about academic job talks, which I have also used when advising graduate students.

You can read the full essay here: jaeyk.github.io/essays/acade...

The Means-Testing Industrial Complex As Republicans tightened work requirements and eligibility rules for Medicaid and SNAP last year, Equifax’s CEO openly celebrated the profits to be made from administering this deprivation.

Today, Luke Farrell (@lukef.bsky.social) explains how complex eligibility requirements have turned America’s safety net into a lucrative revenue stream for monopolistic private contractors.