Research Assistant

This is a contractual appointment for one year, renewable for up to four years of cumulative contractual service, depending on the business need and performance of the incumbent.

The Fund follows a hybrid work schedule. However, analyst positions must be filled with candidates physically residing in the local Metropolitan Washington, DC area (DC/MD/VA).

Job Description

The Strategy, Policy, and Review Department’s (SPR) Macro-Risk Unit is a fast-paced, innovative, technology-focused group that works on assessing global and domestic risks across a range of economic sectors for all countries in the membership. Research assistants (RAs) provide critical  support to the unit, ingesting and managing data, developing and interpreting cutting edge analytical tools for risk assessment, and creating and maintaining a suite data visualization tools to communicate complex machine-learning model output and other analytical work internally and externally. The successful candidate will be one of two RAs in the unit. Past unit RAs have successfully taken positions in the tech industry, finance, and post-graduate study.

Main Responsibilities:

• Import, process, consolidate, and transform data sets within and between databases using statistical and/or econometric techniques, typically requiring programming.
• Analyze economic, financial, or statistical relationships in databases.
• Design, document, and maintain systems to facilitate interface or to transfer data between external and in-house databases.
• Use of text analysis and natural language processing techniques to retrieve relevant information from documents.
• Develop and maintain data visualization tools to communicate model results to economists.
• Prepare Power Point presentations collecting the work of the unit.

The successful candidate will have the following: 

• At a minimum, completion of a Bachelor's degree in economics, computer science, statistics, math, business administration or other related quantitative field.
• Knowledge of machine learning is highly desirable, including model estimation and evaluation in classification and regression tasks.
• Strong programming skills in Python and Stata, knowledge of R, Matlab, highly valued, knowledge of eViews, LaTex, Fortran, VBA, etc. also helpful.
• Data visualization skills including familiarity with PowerBI or Tableau or other data visualization tools, especially Python-based.
• Knowledge of macroeconomics or financial risk assessment is important, and previous contributions to academic or policy-oriented economic research is a plus.
• Full proficiency in Excel, with strong Word and PowerPoint skills a plus.
• Innovation, creativity, proactive problem solving, strong communication skills, and drive for results would be an advantage.