PhD​/ABD graduates Economic Consulting Senior Associate; AEA Market Scramble

(2026 PhD/ABD graduates) Economic Consulting Senior Associate (AEA Job Market Scramble)

Boston, Chicago, New York, Oakland, Washington, DC;
Toronto, ON;
London, UK;
Brussels, BEL

Charles River Associates is a leading global consulting firm that provides economic, financial, and business management expertise to major law firms, corporations and governments around the world. CRA advises clients on economic and financial matters pertaining to litigation and regulatory proceedings, and guides corporations through critical business strategy and performance-related issues. Since 1965, clients have engaged CRA for its combination of industry experience and rigorous, fact-based analysis that provide clients with clear, implementable solutions to complex business concerns .

Practices seeking to hire candidates with this profile include (hiring locations listed):

• Our Competition practice economists provide analysis and testimony in matters involving mergers and acquisitions, antitrust litigation, and global competition policy.
• Energy (Boston, New York, Washington DC)
  • The Energy practice has researched, published, taught, and consulted on energy matters for a wide range of clients, including electric and gas utilities, investors, power asset owners and developers, power agencies, large industrial firms, and clean energy technology leaders.
• Our Finance experts work on valuation issues (shareholder class actions and other corporate valuation disputes), as well as matters focused on the functioning of financial markets and institutions (alleged market manipulation and insider trading).

Learn more about our work by reviewing our Services and Industries on our website .

Senior Associates work closely with senior consultants on project teams. Successful candidates have a strong knowledge of economic concepts and a range of research and quantitative skills. A typical Senior Associate would:

• Conduct research in a team-oriented environment alongside some of the most respected academics, industry experts and regulators in the world;
• Identify and conceptualize issues, design complex economic models to analyze data, and manage the research process;
• Supervise, train and mentor junior analysts;
• Assist in the development and presentation of client deliverables, including expert reports and white papers summarizing opinions, conclusions, and recommendations using market, industry or client-proprietary data;
• Act as a primary point of contact for attorneys and other industry or government clients on a variety of practice-relevant issues;
• Program, build models and/or perform regression analyses in statistical analysis programs (such as Stata, SAS, Python, R, Matlab or Mathematica);
• Ensure the integrity and accuracy of analyses and opinions;
• Participate in practice-building activities (training, recruiting, publication, expertise sharing, etc.).

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Candidates are encouraged toexpress any preferences for a practice area in their application.

• PhD degree in economics with a completion date of December 2025/Summer 2026 and an academic focus on quantitative research, with specializations like industrial organization, applied microeconomics, econometrics, labor, health, intellectual property, corporate finance, financial accounting, or other quantitative areas;
• Curious and analytical thinkers who bring creative approaches to non-standard problems;
• Effective written and oral communication skills;
• Eagerness to learn new skills and programming languages;
• Demonstrated high level of initiative and leadership;
• Strong teamwork and collaboration capabilities;
• Excellent time management and task prioritization skills;
• Clear and demonstrated interest in consulting through coursework, work experience, activities, or attendance at CRA recruiting events;
• Demonstrated understanding of, and ability to explain, economic, financial and/or accounting concepts, and quantitative and qualitative analysis methods;
• Experience in Excel, Stata, Python, R, SQL, SAS, ArcGIS/Arc Py, or Cloud computing (Databricks/Spark, Google Cloud, Azure, AWS);
• As much of our work occurs in our offices, minimal travel is required.

To be considered for a position in the United States, submit through this job posting:

• Resume/CV – please include current address, email and telephone number;
• Cover letter – please describe your interest in CRA and how this role matches your goals. Also, please note if you have interest in a particular practice and/or a location preference;
• Research/Job market paper – please submit your original research or dissertation.

To apply for one of our international locations
, please visit our Careers Site to view available jobs.

Please also note that candidate resume review will commence November 1 and continue on a rolling basis until positions are filled. Interviews will begin following application close, with first round interviews…