NIESR at the Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2021

The RES 2021 Annual Conference is their flagship event which brings together hundreds of academic and professional economists to present the latest developments in economics and showcase their real-world application, will take place virtually from Monday 12 to Wednesday 14 April 2021.  NIESR, ESCoE and Rebuilding Macroeconomics are delighted to be presenting the following:

Monday 12 April

Does the employment effect of National Minimum Wage vary by non-employment rate? A Regression Discontinuity approach
9:00 to 10:30

Chair: Salvatore Lattanzio, University of Cambridge
Presented by: Lei Xu, National Institute of Economic and Social Research

This paper examines the impact of increasing minimum wage on employment by exploiting variation in the age-dependent National Minimum Wage (NMW) in the UK. It extends the Regression Discontinuity model to evaluate the procyclicality of employment effect, and show that previous estimates may be biased due to failure to account for the local non-employment rate. Contrary to the existing literature, the paper reports a positive employment elasticity after accounting for the effect of local labour market conditions. The results suggest that the positive employment effect of increasing minimum wage is strongly procyclical, i.e. is more pronounced in areas with low non-employment rates. Under an assumption that employers have no direct impact around the cut-off point, the results suggest that a higher minimum wage increases labour supply of young workers. 

Improving the communication of economics and economic statistics
15:30 to 17:00
 
Chair: Sumit Dey-Chowdhury (UK Office for National Statistics) "Public Understanding of Economics and Economic Statistics" Presented by Johnny Runge (NIESR, ESCoE) "Communicating Data Uncertainty: Experimental Evidence for U.K. GDP" Presented by Ana Galvao or James Mitchell (Warwick Business School, ESCoE) "Enhancing central bank communications using simple and relatable information" Presented by Nida Broughton (Behavioural Insights Team) Discussant: Mike Hughes or Stian Westlake (Royal Statistics Society)

Tuesday 13 April

Bremia: A study of the impact of Brexit based on bond prices
9:00 to 10:30
 
Session Chair: Alessio Volpicella, University of Surrey
By Jagjit Chadha; NIESR, Arno Hantzsche; HMT, Cyrille Lenoel; NIESR, Corrado Macchiarelli; NIESR, Sathya Mellina; Enel Group
Presented by: Corrado Macchiarelli, NIESR

Many financial prices reacted violently to the result of the UK's advisory referendum held on 23 June 2016 and to the spread of Covid-19. Subsequently financial prices have proved significantly less volatile, both unconditionally and in response to news. To understand what sovereign bond prices might have been telling us about the likely state of the British economy under an exit from the European Union, and its re-orientation in light of Covid-19, the factors determining the term structure of interest rates were modelled. This found that bond yields are driven by macroeconomic factors, as well as by central bank communication which were quantified using text mining techniques. Mapping these results in response to news, revealed that bond yields declined in an anticipation of more expansionary monetary policy. Ultimately this research found that Covid-19 uncertainty did not significantly increase term premia at the 10-year maturity in the same manner as Brexit-related uncertainty, which seems to be consistent with the view that market participants expect a hefty but not enduring, crisis.

Special Session S87: The future of funding economic research in the UK
15:30 to 17:00

With much speculation about the government’s attitude to funding research, the financial squeeze that many universities are facing during Covid and the change of funding focus that may occur with EU Exit and the absorption of ESRC into UKRI, the funding climate for economics looks particularly uncertain.  This panel discussion will provide some valuable pointers for the profession as to the direction that research funding may take over the next few years.  

Session Chair: Jagjit Chadha; NIESR
Prof. Agnès Bénassy Quér, Paris School of Economics.
Clare Lombardelli, Director General, Chief Economic Adviser, HM Treasury.
Prof. Sir Anton Muscatelli, Principal of the University of Glasgow.
Prof. Paul Nightingale, Director of Special Projects, UKRI-ESRC.
Prof. Dame Carol Propper, RES President and Imperial College Business School
 

Wednesday 14 April

Welfare Indicators for Lower Tier Local Authorities in England and Wales in 2016
13:45 to 15:15

By Andrew Aitken; National Institute of Economic & Social Research and Martin Weale; King's College London