Sean Higgins

I’m an Assistant Professor of Finance at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
My research studies how technology reduces frictions in payments markets and consumer financial markets, and the effects of reducing these frictions on households and small firms in emerging economies. Within consumer financial markets, I have a set of papers on frictions that prevent households from saving, and a second set of papers and projects on credit market frictions. My papers employ natural experiments or randomized controlled trials (RCTs) for identification, and generally use a combination of confidential (often transaction-level) administrative data and survey data.
I teach Entrepreneurial Finance and Venture Capital to MBA students. I also co-teach a PhD-level independent study on Household Finance.