Misallocation of resources explains much of the productivity differences across countries, but the role of informal institutions in this misallocation has been little documented. In a recently published paper, Sampreet Goraya, Assistant Professor at the Department of Economics, brings evidence that the Indian caste system has a distortionary effect on capital and talent allocation in the economy.

Louise Bringselius, affiliated researcher at SSE, and Karl Wennberg, scientific director of GaPP, argue that the Western world and Sweden, in particular, face major challenges and fierce international competition in a new Dagens Industri debate article.

In a recently published paper, Céline Zipfel, Assistant Professor at the Department of Economics, with Oriana Bandiera (LSE), Ahmed Elsayed (IZA), and Andrea Smurra (UCL), presents facts on labor markets in Africa and discusses policy priorities for boosting the creation of salaried jobs for young adults.

In a recently published paper, Professor Lars Ljungqvist in the Stockholm School of Economics and Professor Thomas J. Sargent in the New York University further expand their theoretical work on the "fundamental surplus" in matching models.

Policy brief: This brief summarizes the insights shared in the online workshop “Dimensions of Well-being“, where participants presented and discussed their latest research relating to the dimensions of well-being. The two-day workshop was organized by the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics (SITE) as part of the Forum for Research on Gender Economics (FROGEE) and took place on 28-29 June, 2021.

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected our well-being in many dimensions. Understanding how these dimensions interact and what factors influence the overall level of well-being can be instrumental in policy design today and in the process of recovery once the pandemic is over. With this in mind, the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics and the FREE Network invites you to participate in an online academic workshop on 'Dimensions of well-being'.

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected our well-being in many dimensions. Understanding how these dimensions interact and what factors influence the overall level of well-being can be instrumental in policy design today and in the process of recovery once the pandemic is over. With this in mind, the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics and the FREE Network invites academic paper submissions to an online workshop focused on dimensions of well-being.

Policy brief: Most reports on the labor-market effects of the first wave of COVID-19 have pointed to women, low-skilled workers and other vulnerable groups being more affected. Research on the topic shows a more mixed picture. Researchers from the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics (SITE); Pamela Campa, Jesper Roine and Svante Strömberg explores the Swedish labor market during COVID-19 crisis.

New research finds that female founders of entrepreneurial ventures raise significantly more funding when catering to female-dominated industries. Effectively, this means that men are afforded credibility across a broad range of industries, while women are confined to a less lucrative subset of the labor market.

"The longer a person is unemployed, the greater the probability that the individual will not return to work at all. And even if we recover from the pandemic, it is not certain that those people will return", Jesper Roine explains the risk of longterm-unemployment in a recent interview in Dagens industri.