Leonel A. Regalado Cardoso
Ph.D. Student, Agricultural & Applied Economics
Texas Tech University | Free Market Institute
Migration Entrepreneurship Political Economy
I am a Ph.D. student in the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics at Texas Tech University and a Research Assistant at the Free Market Institute. I also serve as a Graduate Instructor in the Area of Energy Commerce & Business Economics at the Rawls College of Business.
My research focuses on migration, entrepreneurship, and political economy, with an emphasis on how institutions, policy environments, and economic incentives influence individual behavior and long-run development outcomes.
Education
Texas Tech University Ph.D. in Agricultural & Applied Economics Expected Spring 2027
Texas Tech University M.S. in Agricultural & Applied Economics 2025
Universidad Francisco Marroquin B.A. in Economics, minor in Finance 2023
University of Buckingham PGCert in Money, Banking & Central Banking 2022
Featured Research
Did the Syrian Refugee Crisis impact European economic freedom?
Using the synthetic control method, we find that the Syrian refugee surge did not meaningfully impact economic freedom in Germany, Austria, or Sweden, despite the largest institutional gap and refugee inflows in modern European history.
Do corruption reforms spur entrepreneurship?
Applying the Callaway and Sant’Anna (2021) DiD estimator, this paper finds that sustained anti-corruption reforms have no significant effect on entrepreneurship, suggesting the growth benefits of reforms flow through other channels.