Hi! I’m Ben Goehring.
I am a PhD Candidate in political science and public policy at the University of Michigan. My research investigates the staffing, oversight, and control of government agencies. In my job market paper, I link longitudinal personnel records of nearly all public employees in twenty U.S. states with voter registration files to examine whether governors try to remove political opponents from the workforce after the passage of policies that make it easier to fire bureaucrats. Other projects investigate how different types of legislative oversight influence nursing home inspections (under review) and the role of the public in checking unilateral presidential actions (published in JEPS).I have helped teach a number courses at the graduate and undergraduate levels, including research design and a seminar for students writing their honors theses. I have also twice served as the instructor of record for our department’s three-week math camp for incoming PhD students. My teaching was recognized by the department in 2022 with the John W. Kingdon Award for Outstanding Teaching. I also enjoy incorporating undergraduates into active research projects. I have published best practices for training and managing undergraduate research assistants, developed an R package to help other researchers supervise their teams, and received the university’s Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program’s Outstanding Research Mentor Award.
I am originally from Fargo, North Dakota and graduated from George Washington University in 2017 with degrees in philosophy and political science. Before graduate school, I studied means-tested social assistance programs as a research assistant at the Urban Institute. I co-authored a couple of reports (here, and here) on states’ Temporary Assistance for Needy Families’ policies and helped maintain the TRIM3 microsimulation model.