Francesca Molinari is a leading authority in econometric theory and applied econometrics.

Molinari’s theoretical research focuses primarily on the study of identification problems, analyzing the limits of what can be learned from available data about causal relationships in economics and in the social sciences. She develops new methods for statistical inference in partially identified models, while her applied work centers on analyzing decision-making under risk and uncertainty, including estimation of risk preferences using market-level data and analysis of individuals’ probabilistic expectations using survey data. 

Professor Molinari’s scholarly contributions have fundamentally shaped the field of partial identification in econometrics, particularly through her innovative use of random set theory as a unifying mathematical framework. Her research addresses the core challenge that available data combined with credible assumptions can yield substantial information about parameters of interest even when they cannot be identified exactly. This work has provided economists with tractable methods to characterize, estimate, and conduct hypothesis tests in situations where traditional point identification is impossible. 

In her applied research, Molinari has made significant contributions to understanding risk preferences and decision-making behavior, particularly through her extensive collaboration with Levon Barseghyan, Ted O’Donoghue, and Joshua Teitelbaum on insurance choice and discrete choice under risk. Her research has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Aging, reflecting the broad impact and policy relevance of her work. Through her comprehensive handbook chapter “Microeconometrics with Partial Identification,” she has also provided the field with an authoritative review of three decades of developments in this crucial area of econometric methodology. 

Molinari is an editor of the Journal of Political Economy and former joint managing editor of the Review of Economic Studies. She is a Fellow of both the Econometric Society and the International Association for Applied Econometrics. She received her Ph.D. from Northwestern University after obtaining her B.A. and master’s in economics from the Università degli Studi di Torino in Italy.