Witnessing the aftermath of the 2023 Jajarkot earthquake in Nepal confronted me with more than just the devastation of collapsed homes and disrupted lives; it exposed the unequal capacity to absorb and recover from shocks. It made me question why, in a world of growing global prosperity, vulnerability remains so unequally distributed - and how economic systems can be designed to reduce such disparities. 

To explore these issues further, I turned to Joseph Stiglitz’s "The Great Divide", which sharpened my understanding of how structural features, from tax regimes to financial deregulation, can entrench inequality rather than reduce it and showed me that the effects of inequality are cumulative and self reinforcing. His critique of the supposed efficiency of markets made me consider the limits of laissez-faire approaches. 

This led me to the work of Gary Stevenson, whose arguments struck me as they exposed inequality not as an accident but a feature of the system. He argues that the richest grow richer not through labour, but through owning assets. In his episode “Rents, profits and interest are all the same thing”, he displays how those without ownership must depend on the wealthy to finance assets, reframing my view of wealth concentration.

A level Mathematics has developed my ability to model complex relationships, applying calculus to optimisation problems. I explored this further by looking at Prof. Grant Sanderson’s series on linear algebra and calculus. This developed my understanding of differential equations for stochastic models as well as deepening my conception of matrices and visualising linear systems. 

To extend my analysis, I entered the FCDO Next Generation Economics Competition, examining debt distress in low-income countries. Researching how debt burdens restrict investment in health, education and infrastructure made me confront the trade-offs policymakers face and confirmed that economics must balance efficiency with equity.In the LSESU Economics Society competition, I explored tariffs and public deficits, building on this earlier work. The Scholars Programme, where I achieved a First, allowed me to investigate trade-offs between economic growth and environmental sustainability.

Selection for a five-day residential at Churchill college, Cambridge, allowed me to explore how government financing can make nuclear energy cheaper than private provision, showing how interest rates and state capacity fundamentally shape markets. Another topic I was particularly drawn to was the concept of “nudges” and how subtle policy can shift individual choices, sparking my interest in behavioural economics.  

To further explore this interest, I delivered a TED-style lecture on incentives covering decision-making, policy and human behaviour. In it, I examined cases showing how monetary rewards can undermine intrinsic and social values, demonstrating that policy interventions do not always change behaviour as expected.

Ha-Joon Chang’s "23 Things They Don’t Tell You About Capitalism" further challenged me to critically consider mainstream assumptions. "Thing 1", which argues that markets are not naturally free, reinforced my understanding from Stevenson and Stiglitz. While "thing 13", his critique of trickle-down economics, resonated with my study of intergenerational inequality, showing that growth alone is insufficient to address structural issues.

A two-week placement in accounting and audit gave me a practical insight into how financial systems operate at a micro level, enhancing my theoretical understanding of incentives and regulation while exploring operational challenges in finance under uncertainty. Attending a symposium led by a PhD tutor on signalling models and "job market signalling", (Spence, 1973) showed me how asymmetric information shapes labour markets and how economic models address it.These experiences have honed my skills and developed ambition, preparing me for the unique demands  of an economics degree.