In the past 200 years, the world has experienced unprecedented economic development as well as profound demographic changes. Many dimensions of these dynamic processes are not well understood. What are the underlying forces behind the different dimensions of economic and demographic development,...

Issues to be addressed include: What is special about the public sector? Public sector efficiency. Public debt sustainability. Changes in the role and size of public sector. Incentives in the public sector. Tax-spending mix. Optimal public policy. Delay of reforms. Rent seeking, tax evasion and...

A new generation of preferential trade agreements (PTAs) is in the making: larger and deeper than most that have been signed earlier. Their focus has moved away from the elimination of tariffs to regulatory cooperation and a WTO-Plus agenda. At the same time, theoretical and empirical modelling...

Behavioural political economy uses behavioural concepts in explaining decisions of politicians, candidates for political office, voters, lobbyists, and others in the political and policymaking arena. Decision-makers may be subject to bounded rationality. Utility maximisation may be based on...

Subsidies to fossil energies are largely wasteful as they serve to increase carbon emissions, weaken public budgets and importers’ energy security, and in most cases impact income distribution adversely. Reform of energy subsidy policies is sorely needed in many countries, and is an important...

Papers from economists and researches from other disciplines working on issues of language policy are solicited. The following is a non-exhaustive list of possible specific themes of individual contributions: - languages and economic efficiency (e.g. languages in the labor market, language as a...

Among the main questions to be addressed are: - Financing new infrastructures in the international debt and post-financial crisis era - Global comparison of different infrastructure roll-out and maintenance approaches including historical analysis - Analysing regulatory barriers to collaboration...

Topics: - Evaluating the effectiveness of policy instruments regarding the achievement of environmental targets - Assessments of environmental policies regarding their effects on economic welfare indicators - How to create sets of instruments with synergetic effects and how to avoid sets with...

Questions to be addressed in the workshop include: - What drives carbon prices? Is there evidence that firms reduced emissions relative to a business-as-usual scenario? Has the EU ETS induced the development new technologies, and/or the adoption of existing technology? - What is the relationship...

This workshop will investigate the determinants and evolution of gender gaps, by focusing on two promising prospects: the institutional design, which –if appropriately set- can allow different outcomes to reflect only differences in abilities rather than in gender, as shown for instance in...