His research interests include immigration, statistical methods, political economy, and political behavior. He has published over 40 articles, many of them in top general science journals and top field journals in political science, statistics, economics, and business. He has also published three open source software packages and his research has received awards and funding from the Carnegie Corporation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the Robin Hood Foundation, the National Science Foundation, the Swiss SNF, the American Political Science Association, Schmidt Futures, the Society of Political Methodology, the National Bureau of Economic Research, and the Midwest Political Science Association.
Hainmueller received his PhD from Harvard University and also studied at the London School of Economics, Brown University, and the University of Tübingen. Before joining Stanford, he served on the faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.