Short biography
I was born in Torrelavega, a town in the center of Cantabria, in northern Spain. I grew up there, spending also a lot of the time in my mother's village, Bárcena de Cudón. Once I finished my high school studies, and after abandoning my childhood dream of becoming a paleonthologist, I decided to study economics at the local Universidad de Cantabria. There was my first contact with game theory, my favorite field at the time, and with the idea of doing research in this field, I decided to study a PhD in economics. Coming from a small, regional university in Spain, I didn't have many choices abroad, and in one of my best life decisions, I went to Madrid to study the MA in economics and finance at CEMFI. This was an eye-opener for me, as I slowly began to like econometrics, and in the end I wrote my master thesis on applied econometrics. Then came the big jump, I wanted to finish my graduate studies abroad, and I chose to go to California, where I simultaneously obtained the PhD in economics and the MA in statistics at UC Berkeley. My research agenda at Berkeley varied from theoretical econometrics to economics of education, and as the job market got closer, I knew it was time to move on again. I got an offer from Banca d'Italia, where I have been an economist since September 2014. I am currently on leave, as I have been awarded a María Zambrano scholarship at Universidad de Cantabria.