We study how policies, markets, and institutions shape the use and protection of land, water, and natural resources, and we produce evidence to help design them better.

PERMIT Lab is an economics research group studying environmental regulation, natural hazards, land and water resources, and international trade. Much of our work depends on building new datasets where existing data fall short. We collaborate with computer scientists and remote sensing researchers across Caltech and JPL, and we train postdocs, graduate students, and undergraduates in interdisciplinary research. Based in the Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences at Caltech, the lab is co-directed by Hannah Druckenmiller and Prakash Mishra.