Christina Stacy

Biography: Christina Plerhoples Stacy is a principal research associate in the Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center at the Urban Institute, where she specializes in urban economics, equity, and inclusion. Her work focuses on the intersection of economics and urban spaces and how housing, transportation, local economies, health, and crime interact. Stacy recently led an effort to develop a set of transportation equity metrics for metropolitan regions throughout the US, and she managed an effort to measure inclusion in US cities. She also led an effort to measure the spatial mismatch between job seekers and employers using big data from Snagajob, the largest online job search engine for hourly workers. Stacy is currently studying whether and how local zoning reforms can increase the supply of affordable housing, and she is helping the City of Alexandria, Virginia, develop an accessory dwelling unit regulation. She is also coleading an evaluation of the New Markets Tax Credit Program, and she is part of a team evaluating the Economic Development Administration. Finally, she is leading a randomized controlled trial of an unconditional and conditional cash transfer program coupled with job training aimed at reducing youth violence. Stacy serves on the board of the Alexandria Housing Development Corporation. Before joining the Urban Institute, Stacy earned her bachelor’s degree from Boston College, her master’s degree from the University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, and her PhD from Michigan State University in agricultural, food, and resource economics.