Ben Wellington blends his love of statistics, the city, and comedy in his entertaining analysis of the story of New York City, told through data.

Why you should listen

Ben Wellington runs the I Quant NY blog, in which he crunches city-released data to find out what's really going on in the Big Apple. To date he has tackled topics such as measles outbreaks in New York City schools, analyzed how companies like Airbnb are really doing in NYC, and asked questions such as "does gentrification cause a reduction in laundromats?" (Answer: inconclusive.)

Ben is a visiting assistant professor in the City & Regional Planning program at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn; his day job involves working as a quantitative analyst at the investment management firm, Two Sigma. A budding comedian and performer, he also teaches team building workshops through Cherub Improv, a non-profit that uses improv comedy for social good.

Ben Wellington’s TED talk