My name is Sun Kyoung Lee, and I usually go by “Sun (ˈsən).” I am a Research Assistant Professor (tenure-track) at the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research, Survey Research Center. Previously, I was a Postdoctoral Associate at the Yale Economic Growth Center (2019–2022). I received my Ph.D. in Economics from Columbia University.
My research lies at the intersection of economic history, spatial economics, and historical data infrastructure. I study long-run American economic development, focusing on how people, ideas, and economic activity move across space and time. My recent work examines migration and mobility, immigration’s contribution to innovation and productivity growth, urban planning’s role in racial segregation in prewar cities, bankruptcy in regional adjustment, and patterns of breakthrough innovation in long-run growth.
I work with quantitative and computational methods—digitization of historical data, machine learning–based record linkage, GIS, spatial econometrics, and quantitative spatial modeling—applied across more than 150 years of U.S. economic history. Beyond historical research, I apply data science to contemporary policy problems, including energy inequality in rural communities and firearm violence. This work has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Census Bureau, the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and other agencies.