Di Tong

PhD Candidate, MIT Sloan

ditong@mit.edu


About

Research

Teaching

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About

I am a PhD candidate at MIT Sloan school of management, affiliated with the Institute for Work and Employment Research. I'm on the 2025-2026 academic job market.

My research focuses on the organization of work, with core components including the content of jobs (skill demands, task composition), the division and valuation of work, labor management strategies, worker voice and representation, and informal social relations in workplaces. I document and explain the formation, variation, and change in work organization as shaped by factors such as manager political values, public policies, and platform algorithmic environments. I also examine the implications of work organization for firm behavior and labor market outcomes, such as pay-setting and wage inequality.

Methodologically, my research primarily uses computational methods and causal inference techniques applied to large-scale sources of digital trace. These sources include job postings, workplace reviews, and LinkedIn worker profiles. I complement these approaches with surveys, qualitative text analyses, and interviews.

I graduated with a M.A. in Computational Social Science from the University of Chicago and a B.A. in English from Tsinghua University.


Working Paper

Manager Political Values and Gendered Work Organization

Job Market Paper

Abstract (click to expand)

Firm Response to Regulatory Costs: Do Minimum Wage Mandates Affect Work Management Practices?

Revise and Resubmit at Management Science

Abstract (click to expand)

Low-skilled Occupations Face the Highest Upskilling Pressure

(with Lingfei Wu and James Evans)

First Author; Minor Revision at Nature Communications

Abstract (click to expand)

Replication Files


Publication

Between-firm Inequality and Informal Social Relations

(with Nathan Wilmers and Victoria Zhang)

American Journal of Sociology 130, no.5 (2025): 1217-1262.

Abstract (click to expand)

An Overview of US Workers’ Current Organizing Efforts and Collective Actions

(with Thomas A. Kochan, Janice R. Fine, Kate Bronfenbrenner, Suresh Naidu, Jacob Barnes, Yaminette Diaz-Linhart, John Kallas, Jeonghun Kim, Arrow Minster, Phela Townsend, and Danielle Twiss)

Work and Occupations 50, no. 3 (2023): 335-350.

Abstract (click to expand)

Full Report Version


Selected Work in Progress

The Valuation of Gender-Typed Work Tasks

Manager Political Values and Gender Wage Gap

United In Numbers: How Fans Become Data Workers

(with Chen Liang)


Teaching

MIT Kaufman Teaching Certification Program (2024 Spring)

TA for MIT Sloan’s 15.665 Power and Negotiation (2023 Spring), 15.268 Choice Points: Thinking about Life and Leadership through Literature (2025 Spring, 2026 Spring)