James K. Hammitt PhD

James K. Hammitt is Professor of Economics and Decision Sciences and Director of the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis. His research and teaching concern development and application of quantitative methods—including risk, decision, and benefit-cost analysis— to health and environmental policy in both industrialized and developing countries. He is particularly interested in comprehensive evaluation of risk-control measures, including ancillary benefits and countervailing risks, and in methods for measuring the value of health risks, including monetary and health-adjusted-life-year metrics.

Professor Hammitt holds degrees in Applied Mathematics and Public Policy from Harvard University and was previously Senior Mathematician at the RAND Corporation, a faculty member at the RAND Graduate School of Policy Studies, and held the Pierre-de-Fermat Chaire d’Éxcellence at the Toulouse School of Economics. He chaired the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Advisory Council on Clean Air Compliance Analysis and has served on the EPA Science Advisory Board and several National Academy of Sciences committees.