VoxTalks Economics

If we focus on the cutting edge of AI implementation, we’re also focusing on a small set of technologically advanced countries. How will AI affect work in the rest of the world, what should those countries do to prepare, and how can they make best use of the technology? Giovanni Melina of the IMF is one of the authors of two papers that calculates both the exposure of jobs to AI around the world, and the readiness of those countries to meet the challenge of using AI effectively at work. 

He talks to Tim Phillips about the ext...

 In the second of special series recorded live at the PSE-CEPR Policy Forum 2025, we are asking, how good is AI at doing real-world job task? And how can we measure their capability without resorting to technical benchmarks that may not mean much in the workplace?

Since we all became aware of large language models, LLMs scientists have been attempting to evaluate how good they are at performing expert tasks. The results of those tests can show us whether LLMs  can be useful complements to our work, or even replacements for us, as many fear. But setting or grading a t...

Recorded live at the PSE-CEPR Policy Forum 2025. 

This year the annual Paris School of Economics-PSE Policy Forum is organized around three themes: artificial intelligence and labour reallocation, working conditions and remote work, and inequality in the workplace. In short, what's work going to look like in the future? 

Our series of podcasts, recorded live at the event, starts with David Autor’s work on the impact of AI on jobs. Rather than speculate about how soon AI will destroy work, David’s research focuses on which tasks AI will automate, and what that means in terms of the...

The Bank for International Settlements Annual Economic Report has just dropped, and there’s a markedly less positive tone than last year, when it was celebrating imminent soft landings in the global economy. It warns of a deteriorating outlook for growth, coupled with vulnerabilities in the global financial system. 

So, what exactly is the BIS worried about, how can policy and regulation respond, and should central banks start worrying about the next systemic crisis?

Gaston Gelos and Frank Smets are Deputy Heads of the Monetary and Economic Department at the BIS and are also two of the...

Whether you are looking at the link from education to economic growth, household earnings or individual happiness, there’s no doubt that a better-educated population is good news. But how can policy improve education in a cost-effective way? You might assume that a good route would be to improve the management of schools, but existing research is not conclusive, and often top-down attempts to improve management meets opposition from administrators.

An experiment in Brazil has evaluated a program to improve management using existing resources in Rio de Janeiro. Tiago Cavalcanti, of University of Cambridge, Sao Paulo School of Ec...

Pedestrianised areas, car-free streets, or low traffic neighbourhoods are increasingly visible in major cities. Whether in London, Paris, New York or Barcelona, these changes are always controversial – but does the loud criticism that we often hear in social media or newspapers really represent the views of voters who are affected by these policies?

Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal of the Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona Institute of Economics and CEPR spoke to Tim Phillips about whether Barcelona’s car-free “Superblocks” were vote-winners or vote-losers for the city’s mayor.

Photo: Cataleirxs

What’s the point of having a job? Clearly, to make money for ourselves and our families. But is it possible for us to discover some bigger purpose or meaning at work. And, if we do, who benefits? That’s the idea that a multinational organisation had when it called in a team of economists to analyse its internal programme called “Find your Purpose” (FYP). The resulting RCT set out to measure whether FYP changed how employees behaved at work, whether it helped them enjoy their jobs, and whether it increased profits too.

Oriana Bandiera of London School of Econo...

Does the public take more notice of the opinions of male or female economists? We know that female experts, whether in science, politics or the media, suffer from an authority gap: their expertise is often not given as much weight by the public as opinions held by less qualified men. But does the gap persist for the very highest achievers? And, if it closes or even reverses for them, what lessons are there for other female experts?  Sarah Smith of the University of Bristol and CEPR recently conducted an experiment about which expert economists are most likely to influence public o...

What if trade policy wasn’t really about trade at all? What if it was about revenge, power, and punishment, tariffs as tantrums and diplomacy as drama? You won’t find the Grievance Doctrine in economics textbooks, but there is one book that explains what it is, what its policies are, and the way it is currently being implemented. Richard Baldwin of IMD Business School in Lausanne, the founder and the Editor-in-Chief of VoxEU is also the author of “The Great Trade Hack”. In it, he sets out the way the Grievance Doctrine has been weaponised by this US administration, how the...

China’s growth as an economic superpower has been based in a large part on its increasing ability to design and manufacture sophisticated, hi-tech goods. But, until recently, it was far from a superpower when it came to creating new knowledge and cutting-edge academic research. Luc Laeven of the ECB and CEPR and his co-authors recently published an analysis of the research output in top journals from Chinese academics over the last two decades, and the results are startling: in many areas of science, China is now clearly the world leader. Luc talks to Tim Phillips about how China’s plan...

Does economic growth inspire us to trust our governments? A new paper finds a surprisingly strong and consistent relationship between trust and economic growth – not for this quarter, or this year, but over our lifetimes. Tim Besley of the London School of Economics tells Tim Phillips how we can measure trust in a government around the world, and the strong and consistent relationship between long-run growth and trust. 

Recently, students all over the world have been demonstrating in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza or in support of the policies of the Israeli government. At times, police have been required to keep the two sides apart. Protests, sit-ins and encampments are scenes familiar on many campuses. Sciences Po in Paris, is one of the locations where protests have made national news. But a decade ago, a natural experiment on the effects of friendship at Sciences Po showed that there is potential for students to bridge political gaps simply by getting to know each other better for a short time...

With the major geopolitical powers squaring up to each other, tariffs on trade and political turmoil, is it time for economics to focus more on the consequences for the world economy of great power rivalry? A new paper defines the emerging field of geoeconomics, reviews the existing research, and sets out an agenda to fill the gaps in what we know. Christoph Trebesch of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy & Cathrin Mohr of Bonn University talk to Tim Phillips about how economists can collaborate with other disciplines to find fresh insights in this under-researched discipline. 

Download CEPR d...

Getting accepted to an elite PhD programme with a superstar advisor seems like “making it” if you want a research career in economics. But is it? How productive will those young, talented economists become? Half of elite economics PhDs from programmes at MIT, Harvard, Stanford and similar institutions publish next to nothing in the six years after they get their doctorate, and only 10% publish more than a paper or two. Josh Angrist of MIT & Marc Diederichs, University of Passau have studied what they call the economics PhD education production function at elite universities in the US. Tim Phillips asks them how...

What gives a life meaning? Is it about health, friends, family or something else? Do rich people have more meaningful lives than poor people? Do we find meaning in success or problems and failures too? During the Great Depression, the US Government Federal Writers’ Project dispatched a team of writers across the US with a simple brief: talk to people about their lives. The archive that they created, called American Life Histories, tells us what thousands of people across the US found meaningful in their lives. A new project uses artificial intelligence to discover what these documents reveal about the me...

President Trump, aided by DOGE under Elon Musk, promised deep cuts to the US federal bureaucracy. In these cases, and many others in recent history, populist politicians complain about a bloated and unelected “administrative state” that they inherit from a previous regime. They say these public employees frustrate their ability to deliver on their promises. Others argue that a bureaucracy contains the experts that are needed to make policy function smoothly – and removing them will make government function less, not more, efficiently.

So how do populists typically deal with their bureaucrats, and what are the consequences?

An ana...

Central banks play a crucial role in modern economies, managing money supply, setting interest rates, and ensuring financial stability. But their relationship with governments, particularly their role as financial agents of the state, creates potential risks that could threaten economic stability. Does the way central banks are structured and operate obscure the true fiscal health of the state, and pose risks for the wider economy? That’s what Willem Buiter – former Chief Economist at Citigroup, former member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England, among many other things – claims. 

In conversation with Tim Phillips, he sets ou...

Do you and your boss see the world in the same way and how does that affect your performance at work? You might not agree with your boss about everything. But if you and your boss don’t have the same outlook, does this mean you will be less productive? Alexia Delfino of Bocconi University measured both the values and the performance of employees at a global bank. She tells Tim Phillips whether shared values mean better outcomes – and what this means for diversity and team building.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. The menopause can be a huge biological shock to women, but there has been almost no research into the consequences for their working lives. A new study uses administrative data from Norway and Sweden to discover the consequences of the menopause, both for health and for earnings. Rita Ginja of the university of Bergen tells Tim Phillips about the surprising size and persistence of the menopause penalty, and the difference that education and choice of career can make.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. Whenever economists gather, you will find many of tomorrow’s best economists too. They get a rare chance to present their research, and traditionally we like to ask three of them to talk to us about it too. In this episode, Tim Phillips talks to three more young researchers about their work – and about how economics can do better. Matyas Molnar of Central European University describes his paper “International exhibitions as trade promotion”. Laura Arnemann of the University of Mannheim investigated “Taxes and Pay without Performance: Evidence from Executives”. And Gustavo García Bernal of Sciences P...

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. Everywhere in the world there is still a stigma around periods. That can lead to bullying or exclusion in schools. Girls are stressed, and that affects their ability to study. In Madagascar, an RCT set out to end the stigma by discussing menstruation openly and seeking out Young Girl Leaders who could help their peers understand what was happening, and why it shouldn’t be a source of embarrassment or shame. Karen Macours of the Paris School of Economics tells Tim Phillips about the extraordinary effect of the programme on mental health and graduation ra...

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. During the first half of the 20th century, the US introduced state laws that imposed restrictions on when and how women were permitted to work outside the home. These laws seem bizarre in 2025. Why were they introduced – and why were they eventually repealed? In the first of three episodes to celebrate International Women’s Day, Tim Phillips talks to Anne Hannusch of the University of Mannheim about what motivated the movement to keep women out of the workplace, and what, eventually, brought them back in.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. Recent research shows that our sex and race still affect our life chances. New evidence investigates whether class is still important in one profession that's close to home: academia. Anna Stansbury of MIT talks to Tim Phillips about what we mean when we talk about class, how it affects the careers of academics who get their PhDs from the top universities in the US – and why the class system, at least in academia, still exists.

It seems like many more of us have been working from home for at least part of the week. But bosses fret about the effect on productivity when their employees are out of sight. And we’re increasingly hearing about companies who are demanding that their staff to return to the office for four, or even five, days a week. Alessandra Fenizia of George Washington University talks to Tim Phillips about her research into a group of hybrid workers in the UK public sector whose work patterns make it possible to compare productivity at home and in the office. 

It is now a month since President Trump’s inauguration, and it’s fair to say that a lot has happened already. In a special episode we talk to Moreno Bertoldi of ISPI and Marco Buti of EUI about how the EU can be smart when imposing reciprocal tariffs, whether the US economic agenda and the EU’s growth strategy are sustainable – and how the EU can maintain a united front in response to a looming trade war. 

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. Do the most productive people work more or less than others? It’s a question that is constantly asked in economics, not least because the available data that compares the differences in working hours between rich and poor countries, or the same country over time, often seems to confound our expectations. Jonna Olsson tells Tim Phillips about how a simple model gives us an insight into the problem and suggests one way we can make sense of this puzzle.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. Europe faces a gigantic climate investment gap. Can an EU climate debt financing scheme help to close it? To do this, Irene Monasterolo and her co-authors are proposing the joint issuance of climate bonds by the European Stability Mechanism, funded by selling greenhouse gas emission allowances via the ETS. She talks to Tim Phillips about what this would mean in practice for the greening of the monetary system and the efforts of EU states to counter the effects of climate change – and also the political impact if the funding mechanism creates the EU’s firs...

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. At COPs or the WEF, we regularly hear about ambitious tree-planting initiatives. These massive programs have been praised as a way to motivate entire communities to join the fight against climate change, but do we know what their impact on the environment or the economy would be? An ingenious piece of research that evaluates a century-old environmental policy in the US gives us a valuable new insight into what planting trees, if done carefully, can achieve. Florian Grosset-Touba spoke to Tim Phillips about the history of tree-planting programmes, where and how to plant them...

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium.  For several decades, global financial markets have been increasingly integrated. But has that process now gone into reverse? If so, what blocs does the fracturing of global financial markets create, and what might be the consequences of what we now call financial deglobalization? Linda Goldberg and Signe Krogstrup spoke to Tim Phillips about what these changes in the global financial system might mean for price stability, financial stability, and payments.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. Can cryptocurrencies be useful? Not just for crypto bro speculators, but as a shield against the depreciation of the official currency if a government is determined to pursue inflationary policies – a proposition first argued by Friedrich Hayek in his 1976 book “The Denationalisation of Money”. Bruno Biais tells Tim Phillips how this might work and is already happening in some countries. 

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. How effective have the trade sanctions imposed on Russia in 2022 been? Politically, they were comprehensive and quick. But anecdotal reporting has suggested that Russian firms that wanted to get round the sanctions could do so. To reach a more rigorous conclusion, Tim Phillips spoke to Dzhamilya Nigmatulina about the research that she and her colleagues have done using domestic railway shipments, firm balance sheets, and government procurement data to produce the most comprehensive analysis so far of the economic impact so far of the trade sanctions on Russia.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. When Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in 2022, it was already under sanctions for annexing Crimea in 2014. But did the gradual way in which these well intended “smart sanctions” were phased in during the 2010s allow many Russian banks, and their customers, to avoid any negative consequences? Mikhail Mamonov tells Tim Phillips about the consequences, or lack of them, of the smart sanctions imposed on Russia. 

In economically depressed regions of the US – the “heartland” – President Trump’s 2018 trade war was a popular decision: “We’re going to bring jobs back to our country,” he told voters. Did the tariffs he imposed generate jobs? And what was the impact of the retaliatory tariffs imposed by China? David Dorn talks to Tim Phillips about the recent history of US trade policy, and what this means for Trump 2.0.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. For two decades Maurice Obstfeld has been researching the causes and consequences of the global trade imbalances in the world economy. Now, as are seeing a retreat from globalisation, they are once again a talking point for President Trump’s trade policymakers. He talks to Tim Phillips about whether the popular narratives about their cause and effect stand up to scrutiny, and the consequences of the Trump 2.0 policy promises that those narratives have inspired.

Recorded at the CEPR Paris Symposium. In the first of a series of episodes from CEPR’s annual festival of new research, we ask: can artificial intelligence help agencies and governments cope with natural disasters, by making it more practical to take anticipatory action? The topic is the subject of a new policy insight from CEPR, and Tim Phillips speaks to two of the authors: Margherita Philipp and Hannes Mueller about the potential and problems of AI-driven expert systems that can predict where disasters might happen.

A surprising number of children are isolated at school. How can teachers spot this social exclusion, and what can they do to make every child feel included? An intervention in primary schools in Italy gave teachers the information to help them recognise and help isolated children. Michela Carlana of Harvard tells Tim Phillips how identifying the problem can be the first step to solving it. 

After Russia after invaded Ukraine, 45 countries imposed sanctions. Turkiye was among those that did not. Have Turkiye’s exporters filled the gap created by the reduction in exports from other sources? If so, how do they manage the reputational and operational risks in trading with Russia? Giancarlo Corsetti, Banu Demir and Beata Javorcik have used firm-level data to discover whether Turkiye’s firms have been “Trading around geopolitics”. They tell Tim Phillips why imposing trade sanctions can be like “squeezing a balloon”.

Climate change, and policies that governments implement to address it, increasingly have macroeconomic impacts that are relevant for Central banks. But, within their remit, what actions can monetary policymakers take, and what actions should they take? These are questions that Frank Elderson is well qualified to answer. He is a member of the Executive Board of the European Central Bank and Vice-Chair of the Supervisory Board of the European Central Bank, he is co-Chair of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Risks of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, and he was the first Chair of the Network of Central...

What effect do populist rulers of economic superpowers have on international relations, peace, and inequality? If a populist takes power in one of these countries, does it lead to more conflict in other places? Massimo Morelli describes Donald trump as “The quintessential populist”. As Trump prepares to resume his presidency in the US, he shares some surprising conclusions with Tim Phillips about the places that have a higher risk of conflict as a result. 

The first in a short series of VoxTalks inspired by papers from the 3rd Kiel-CEPR Conference on Geoeconomics.

How do men think they should behave? How important is it to dominate, to win, to control women, or to refuse help? How do views on this correlate to economic performance, to men’s physical and mental health, even to politics? Ralph De Haas and Victoria Baranov are two of the authors of research into what masculinity means around the world. They tell Tim Phillips about the surprising differences they discovered.