Interview with Ricardo Hausmann

Filippo Gaddo, Managing Director at Alvarez and Marsal, SPE Councillor, and host of the Econ Thoughts SPE Podcast, spoke with Ricardo Hausmann, founder and director of Harvard’s Growth Lab and Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at the Harvard Kennedy School.

The conversation explored the origins of the Growth Lab, Hausmann’s influential work on economic complexity, and the policy implications for growth, resilience, and diversification. Ricardo describes the Growth Lab as the equivalent of a “teaching hospital” for economic development: governments are the patients, real-world policy challenges are the cases, and the aim is not only to treat but to generate frameworks, tools, and diagnostics for wider application. Among these are the Atlas of Economic Complexity, Metroverse for cities, and Greenplexity for energy transition pathways.