Engagement activities

Teaching awards

The Department of Economics Teaching Award for 2023 was awarded to Dr Siew Ling Yew. 

Dr Anupama Sethi and Dr Koh Geok May from the Malaysia School of Business have been jointly awarded the 2023 Department of Teaching Award (DETA).

Research awards

Prof Andreas Leibbrandt and Dr Mladen Adamovic received the 2023 Best Paper award from the journal Leadership Quarterly for their paper 'Is there a glass ceiling for ethnic minorities to enter leadership positions? Evidence from a field experiment with over 12000 job applications'.

Dr Filip Premik received the Young Economists’ Essay Awards at the EARIE 2024 conference.

Congratulations to all recipients!

A/Prof Gaurav Datt (PI) and Dr Emilia Tjernstrom (Co-PI) were awarded a three-year, US$1.86 million grant by SPIA-CGIAR (Standing Panel on Impact Assessment-Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research) for a project that will estimate the return on CGIAR’s investments in India’s agricultural technology frontier. Collaborating with local researchers and partners from India's National Agricultural Research System, they will use cutting-edge data collection methods—including DNA fingerprinting and remote-sensing—to generate data on technology adoption with a view to provide actionable insights into how the CGIAR system's innovations contribute to sustainable agriculture, climate adaptation, and food security.

A/Prof Paulo Santos is part of a team that was awarded a grant for the project ‘Recognising and rewarding the contribution of Indigenous Knowledge for the sustainable management of biodiversity’ by the UK's Global Centre on Biodiversity for the Climate (GCBC). The total value of the grant is GBP 741,000. Partners are WCS-Cambodia (lead organisation), Cambodia Indigenous People Organization (CIPO) and Oxford University.

He is also part of the recently formed Working Group Sharing the Benefits of Conservation, funded by the Science for Nature and People Partnership (SNAPP)

Prof Sascha Becker gave a keynote lecture at the Ifo CEMIR Junior Economist Workshop on Migration Research, in Munich, Germany

Prof Emeritus Yew-Kwang Ng delivered a public forum (in Chinese), ‘Fallacies in environmental economics that have to be corrected’, on 3 July 2024 at the Forum for Climate Change Economics. A video recording of the forum is available on bilibili.com.

A/Prof Paulo Santos presented ongoing work on the relationship between income and wildlife hunting in Cambodia (with Sharar Kader, Emiel de Lange, Henry Travers and Kimchinn Sok) at a policy workshop held in Phnom Penh on September 5. This was preceded by meetings with the Ministry of Environment of Cambodia on the scope for using cash transfers (in particular, UBI) to reduce biodiversity loss in the country.

An article on the middle income trap by Prof Ranjan Ray has been featured in Monash Business School’s Impact publication.

Professor Sascha O. Becker gave a presentation on “Publish, Not Perish” to early-career researchers in Berlin, on Friday, 14 June.

He also presented his paper “Discrimination, Political Orientation, and the Probability of Emigration: University Professors in Fascist Italy” (joint with Luca De Benedictis) at The Rockwool Foundation Berlin on Thursday, 13 June and in Paris on Monday 17June.

Dr Mita Bhattacharya presented and discussed papers during the 99th Annual Conference organised by Western Economic Association .

Dr. Claudio Labanca co-organized the 4th Australian Workshop on Public Finance. The workshop, held on June 13-14 in Canberra, featured Professor Wojciech Kopczuk, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Public Economics and Professor of Economics and International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, as the keynote speaker. The conference provided an opportunity to discuss the development of Australian administrative data and for researchers using large administrative datasets to share their latest research and insights with policymakers.

Associate Professor Michelle Rendall was awarded the Royal Economic Society Prize, 2023 Best Paper Award, “Spatial Polarization” with Ass. Prof. Fabio Cerina, Ass. Prof. Elisa Dienesca and Professor Alessio Moro.

Professor Yves Zenou gave the keynote lecture at 23^rd Journées Louis-André Gérard-Varet, Palais du Pharo, Marseille, 26-28 June 2024.

He also presented at the following workshops and seminars:

• Barcelona School of Economics (BSE) Summer Forum, Workshop on Networks, Barcelona,  6-7 June, 2024.
• 11th annual Toulouse Economics and Biology Workshop, The Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse (IAST) and Toulouse School of Economics (TSE), Toulouse, 3-4 June, 2024.
• Department seminar series, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy, May 23, 2024.
• Economic Theory, Decision Theory and Experimental Economics Seminar, Bocconi University, Milan, Italy, 21 May, 2024.

Monash Laboratory for Experimental Economics (MonLEE) hosted 26 students from John Monash Science School (JMSS) and 78 students from Mac. Robertson Girls’ High School during Semester 1, 2024. Each school experienced a full-day excursion at the Clayton Campus.

In our program provided to the high school students, in the Design sessions facilitated by MonLEE manager Sumaiya Bhura, students learnt about how to apply experimental methodology to solve their own research problems, while also understanding the role of randomisation and ethical principles.

In the coding sessions conducted by MonLEE managers Zhongwen Chen and Yuet Lyu, students learnt how researchers code to implement experiments in the lab and played games commonly used in lab experiments.

Students also had the opportunity to try MonLEE’s VR equipment.  With support from Zhongwen Chen, Xiaojian Zhao, the Virtual & Augmented Reality Services (VARS) team, and RAs at the Monash Nexus of Emerging Technologies (MNET), students participated in immersive VR experiments, experiencing the research done at MonLEE.

Our colleagues also shared their expertise with the students. Associate Professor Vai-Lam Mui discussed “Material Needs, Non-Material Needs, and Community as the Third Social Order” with JMSS students. Professor Erte Xiao introduced “Behavioural and Experimental Economics” to Mac. Rob. students, while Dr Birendra Rai discussed issues of gender and discrimination.

In addition, Amy Newman and Stephanie Hah from Monash Business School’s recruitment team provided students with an overview of Monash Business School opportunities.

These events aimed to inspire high-school students’ intrinsic motivation in topics of behavioural and experimental economics, cultivating a broader sense of community engagement going beyond traditional boundaries.

In 2023, the Department of Economics established the Klaus Abbink Honours Scholarship, in memory of our late colleague

Professor Abbink was regarded as a great supervisor and teacher for his students, always passing on his exceptional critical thinking and research principles. He was very patient and provided consistent care and equal effort for everyone that crossed his path.

This scholarship is one of 2-4 scholarships awarded each year to incoming Economics Honours students. All applicants to the Honours program are considered for this scholarship, with it awarded based on academic merit.

The first scholarship has been awarded to Filip Rozov.

"I am deeply honoured to be the inaugural recipient of the Klaus Abbink Honours Scholarship. The opportunity this scholarship provides will empower me to pursue my studies, fostering both my academic growth and understanding in the field of economics,” says Filip Rozov.

The Department shared this news with Dr Abbink’s family.

His sister replied:

"Thank you very much for the information about the scholarship and the message from Filip. We are very happy and honoured to hear that Klaus will be remembered at Monash this way. We wish Filip a successful and instructive course of study.”

Further, Susama Mahnaz has been awarded the Ian Little Scholarship, and Daniel Arzhintar received the final Economics Honours Merit Scholarship.

Dr Ricardo Dahis has been awarded a grant as part of the J-PAL JOI-Brazil initiative, “Bridging the Soft Skills Gap Through Technology”, with funding of 499,384 BRL (about 154,000 AUD).

Dr Krisztina Orban has won a STEG grant to study South African post-apartheid economic transformation using new data.

Dr Gennadi Kazakevitch has extended the scope of his involvement with SBS by agreeing to provide occasional briefs on economic affairs for SBS News in English.  His first segment was on soaring rent across the capital cities in this country.

The research of Associate Professor Rigissa Megalokonomou is featured in two publications:  “Human Capital Depreciation: Evidence from Teacher Waitlists”, Faculti, November 2023 and  “Teacher gender biases exist and have long-term effects”, CEPR Policy Portal, VOX EU, September 2023.

Associate Professor Vinod Mishra was interviewed on SBS Radio (Hindi) on the 26th of January 2024 about the impact of Stage 3 tax cuts on an individual level and broadly on the Australian economy.

On February 21 2024 he was interviewed on SBS Radio (Hindi) about the causes and consequences of the falling savings rates in the Australian economy.

Professor Ranjan Ray has been featured in Monash Lens regarding indigenous mental health.

Professor Yves Zenou’s research on political trenches was featured in a CEPR Vox column.

Monash Business School’s presence at COP28

At COP28 in November 2023 in Dubai, Monash University became the first university in the Southeast Asian region to have their own pavilion in the Blue Zone. Associate Professor Anke Leroux from the Department of Economics represented Monash Business School and its Green Lab at the huge event.

“It was an amazing experience. Over ten days the Monash University Pavilion hosted  300 speakers and about 10 000 visitors. It was great to work with staff from other faculties and we got a good reputation early on for putting on great events so that contributed to the high number of visitors,” she said.

With the support of Green Lab and the Department of Economics, A/Prof Leroux spent the second week at the Monash Pavilion in the Blue Zone - a section of the conference with access only to party delegations, negotiators, heads of state and other government delegates, accredited press and admitted observers. This means unprecedented access to key stakeholders.

“It was a massive exposure and we had full programs for all the days. We wanted to have in-person events, so it was all about talking to partners and organising events that matched our visions and the Monash Impact 2030 strategic plan,” A/Prof Leroux said.

On day 9, Monash Business School and Green Lab Director A/Prof Anita Foerster organised a panel on the role of carbon offsets in achieving corporate Net Zero in Australia, featuring government, industry and science representatives, and moderated by A/Prof Leroux.

A/Prof Leroux was also “day lead” on Day 10, which was designated the UN theme Food, Agriculture and Water. She organised all the day’s events in the Monash Pavilion, featuring representatives from Indigenous communities, NGOs, governments, and industry investors. The interactive and immersive events used video, music, 3D models, panels and networking to discuss and reflect on food and water security.

“We had an event called Voices of Resilience where 3D models illustrated the impact of climate change on Pacific Islands and chats on how diverse knowledge of Indigenous people contributes to water resilient food systems,” A/Prox Leroux said.

“We showed video testimonials from pacific nations, and it so happened there was an Australian government official in the audience who was so moved by the testimonials that they went back and shared them with the entire Australian delegation. It’s very rare to have that kind of impact and access to government,” she said.

There was even an onsite version of “shark tank” for start-ups, A/Prof Leroux said.

“Climate tech start-ups were invited to pitch their ideas to investors and venture capitalists in the audience. So, we basically connected climate start-ups with money. That was a great event.”

In the future, A/Prof Leroux hopes more Monash Business School representatives will attend COP meetings under the Monash University umbrella.

“It is very important that we are represented with the other faculties. I would also like to see more exposure at COP of the excellent climate change-related research we do here at the Business School and across the University,” she said.

Other event-related news and achievements

In January 2024, Professor Sascha Becker gave a Keynote Lecture at the CIVICA Workshop on Historical Persistence Mechanisms, at Central European University in  Vienna, Austria.

Associate Professor Quoc-Anh Do recently attended the ASSA meetings in San Antonio, Texas, in Jan 2023, and the IEA meeting in Medellin, Colombia.

Dr Ricardo Dahis attended the STEG Annual Conference 2024 in Abu Dhabi and he will attend the UNU-WIDER Development Conference in Mozambique.

Associate Professor Rigissa Megalokonomou gave a public lecture at an Economic Society of Australia event on how to encourage girls in STEM and reduce the gender pay gap.

She also presented at the following international conferences:

• CDES Sustainable Development Conference 2023, June 2023.
• 2023 International Workshop on Applied Economics of Education, June 2023.
• 36th Annual Conference of the European Society for Population Economics, June 2023.
• 21st Conference on Research on Economic Theory and Econometrics, July 2023.

Professor Yves Zenou gave the keynote lecture at the Asian (South/Central/West) Meetings of the Econometric Society, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, 12-15 January, 2024.

On Feb 19 and 20, MonLEE had a two-day special orientation at the Clayton campus, organised by Associate Professor Xiaojian Zhao. During this event, MonLEE recruited more than 300 students and staff registering as new users added in the MonLEE subject pool.

There was excellent input from Sumaiya Bhura, Zhongwen Chen, Zibo Jin, Eric Liu and Yuet Lyu from our BET group, and support from Justin Barugahare, Will Keeble and Mia Liao from Monash Emerging Technology Themes and Applications (METTA), an eSolutions group for students undertaking our VR experiments.

Professor Sascha Becker has been named one of 12 new Fellows of the International Economic Association, conferred to economists worldwide who have made an important contribution through the creation or dissemination of new ideas and high-quality policy work.

He has also been elected to the Australasian Regional Standing Committee of the Econometric Society.

Associate Professor Quoc-Anh Do has been appointed to the Editorial Board of the Journal of International Economics and Management. This journal is based and managed by the Foreign Trade University, Hanoi, Vietnam.

Dr Gordon Leslie has been appointed Associate Editor at The Electricity Journal and President-elect at the Transportation and Public Utilities Group (TPUG)

Professor Kaveh Majlesi (pictured with Deputy Dean, Research, Professor Russell Smyth) was awarded the Dean’s Award for Research Excellence in 2023 plus the  Department of Economics Research Excellence award for 2023 .

Professor Yves Zenou has been named Economic Theory Fellow of the Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory.

Dr Ricardo Dahis has been awarded a grant as part of the J-PAL JOI-Brazil initiative, “Bridging the Soft Skills Gap Through Technology”, with funding of 499,384 BRL (about 154,000 AUD).

Dr Krisztina Orban has won a STEG grant to study South African post-apartheid economic transformation using new data.

Dr Gennadi Kazakevitch has extended the scope of his involvement with SBS by agreeing to provide occasional briefs on economic affairs for SBS News in English.  His first segment was on soaring rent across the capital cities in this country.

The research of Associate Professor Rigissa Megalokonomou is featured in two publications:  “Human Capital Depreciation: Evidence from Teacher Waitlists”, Faculti, November 2023 and  “Teacher gender biases exist and have long-term effects”, CEPR Policy Portal, VOX EU, September 2023.

Associate Professor Vinod Mishra was interviewed on SBS Radio (Hindi) on the 26th of January 2024 about the impact of Stage 3 tax cuts on an individual level and broadly on the Australian economy.

On February 21 2024 he was interviewed on SBS Radio (Hindi) about the causes and consequences of the falling savings rates in the Australian economy.

Professor Ranjan Ray has been featured in Monash Lens regarding indigenous mental health.

Professor Yves Zenou’s research on political trenches was featured in a CEPR Vox column.

Australian Economics Conference season 2023

The Australian  Economics conference season is upon us - a time many Economists take part in and look forward to.

“The Australian Economics Conference Season in November and December each year is a highlight of the year, Professor Sascha Becker said.

“Each week features workshops in economics, many in Melbourne. We have many visitors from the Northern Hemisphere who escape the cold weather to enjoy the Australian summer and the great hospitality of the closely-knit Economics community ‘down under’,” Prof Becker said.

Here is an incredible list of some of the many events our colleagues will take part in:

A/Prof Anke Leroux is heading to Dubai in December as part of Monash’s Delegation to COP28. She will be representing Monash Business School and Green Lab, and is currently co-organising events with A/Prof Anita Foerster to be run at the Monash Blue Zone Pavilion.

From the COP28 Taskforce:

“It is an especially exciting COP for Monash this year, as this will be the first year the University hosts a pavilion in the UNFCCC-managed Blue Zone. In fact, Monash will be the first and (as far as we’re aware) only University in the Indo-Pacific region to host a pavilion in the Blue Zone.  It’s a considerable investment of time and resources and aims to communicate the university’s profound commitment to climate action in the critical days ahead.

“As Australia’s largest and most global university, with an international footprint across Australia, Asia Pacific, Europe, India and China, we are developing a thought-provoking agenda for COP28 that reflects the urgency of this moment and our role, as part of a global community, to mitigate and address the climate crisis.

“Our pavilion aims to do far more than feature Monash achievements or projects – instead, we aim to create a space for a wide range of partners and organisations to have transformative, bold, and where needed difficult, conversations.

“Our COP28 Taskforce is busy curating a series of engaging events and presentations to cover the full two weeks at COP.”

Associate Professor Choon Wang, Professor Asad Islam, Dr Kushneel Prakash (Uni Melbourne; former PhD student), and Professor Russell Smyth travelled to Fiji to engage with the industry, universities and ministries from 19 October to 27 October. They undertook research and policy meetings with the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Professor Biman Prasad, the Ministry of Sugar Industry and stakeholders, Fiji Rice PTE Ltd, Energy Fiji Ltd, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Agriculture and Waterways, University of South Pacific, and Fiji National University.

Monash Business School and Melbourne University academics travelled to Fiji in October 2023 to meet government and business officials and local academics.

A/Prof Quoc-Anh (Q.A.) Do was recently invited to join the CESifo, a global independent research network based in Munich whose mission is to advance international scientific knowledge exchange about economics and economic policy.

It is both an important research tool and a highly visible publication outlet for its members.

Dr Mita Bhattacharya has had two PhD students complete their theses:

• Dr Arjita Sikder
  • Thesis title: Three essays on energy and development economics
  • Supervisors: Mita Bhattacharya, Vinod Mishra.
• Dr Diep Phan
  • Thesis Title: Essays on the economics of night-time lights: Data with applications to energy and economic development
  • Supervisors: Mita Bhattacharya, Russell Smyth, and Xibin Zhang.

Dr Ricardo Dahis is attending the NEUDC conference at Harvard on November 4-5.

A/Prof Xiaojian Zhao and M. Zhongwen Chen will present at Judgement and decision-making in the virtual and real worlds; the fifth annual Monash Business Behavioural Laboratory (MBBL) Symposium, on November 20 and 21.

Prof Yves Zenou will give the plenary lecture at the 2024 Asia Meeting of the Econometric Society, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, 12-15 January 2024.

Prof Erte Xiao and Prof Lata Gangadharan recently won The Leadership Quarterly 2022 Best Article Award (Nisvan Erkal, Lata Gangadharan and Erte Xiao (2022) for their article: "Leadership Selection: Can Changing the Default Break the Glass Ceiling?"

Prof Chongwoo Choe received the International Journal of Industrial Organization (IJIO) Best Theory Paper Award 2023: (Chongwoo Choe, Noriaki Matsushima and Mark J. Tremblay), "Behavior-based personalized pricing: When firms can share customer information.

Four researchers from the department have been awarded ARC grants this year. Congratulations!

Together with a group of researchers from the department of Econometrics and Business Statistics Dr Qingyuan Du was awarded $ 309, 037 for a project entitled “Implications of global economic forces for domestic monetary policy.”

Professors Lata Gangadharan and Erte Xiao were awarded  $ 344,400 for their project “Changing institutions to mitigate gender leadership gaps: Power of defaults”

This years’ department awards for teaching were announced at the department meeting on July 14.

Associate Professor Xiaojian Zhao was awarded a commendation.

Ms Zhongwen Chen received the award for best TA.

Ms Icy Guo received a commendation in the TA awards.

Dr Mita Bhattacharya presented the paper  'A cross-country study on the resilience of electricity consumption to COVID-19 contaminant policies', at WEA International, July 2022 in San Diego (virtual presentation).

Dr Laura Puzzello organised a three- day workshop between July 18-20 on Meeting AEA replication standards using Quarto and GitHub. The workshop was aimed at all members of the department as well as PhD students. The workshop was instructed by Ms Cynthia Huang.

On August 4 2023 Associate Professor Xiaojian Zhao is organising the Monash Business School Workshop to Further Interdisciplinary Research on Motivated Cognition in Virtual Reality. He is also one of the speakers along with Ms Zhongwen Chen from the department.

The focus of the workshop is to encourage speakers from different disciplines to share their expertise and create new opportunities in the interdisciplinary dialogue and collaborations. It attempts to explore the use of VR technology and machine learning to conduct a fully controlled economic experiment of human behaviours that could be difficult to achieve in the standard fields and laboratories.

Professor Yves Zenou has presented at the following institutions during May and June 2023.

• Economics seminar series, New York University at Abu Dhabi (NYUAD), May 1, 2023.
• Center for Behavioral Institutional Design (C-BID) seminar series, New York University at Abu Dhabi (NYUAD), May 4, 2023.
• Workshop on social and economic networks, AMU-AMSE, Marseille, June 1-2, 2023.
• Seminar in economic development, Paris School of Economics, June 12, 2023.
• Seminar at the department of economics, Stockholm University, June 15, 2023.

Professor Sascha Becker has been appointed Joint Managing editor of The Economic Journal.

Congratulations to Dr Stefanie Fischer who has been promoted to Associate Professor and Dr Isaac Gross who was promoted to Senior lecturer.

A number of new staff are due to arrive in the coming months. We look forward to making them feel welcome!

Dr Ricardo Dahis arrived July 31.

Dr Maxime Gravouille arrives later in the year.

Professor Moshe Hazan arrives September 1.

Dr Filip Premik arrives September 1.

Department Teaching Assistant Induction 

The Department TA Induction was held on 21 February 2023. A warm welcome was given by A/Prof Vinod Mishra (Deputy HOD) to the 2023 TA team members. We had a great turnout, and it was an excellent opportunity for everyone to get to know each other. Dr Jaai Parsanis (Learning and Teaching Director) and Dr Anupama Sethi (TA Coordinator) provided information regarding the resources, support available to the TAs and their role. Thank you to Dr George Rivers for sharing his video discussing the expectations from TAs, and Dr Anthony Niu for giving a demo tutorial.  We thank our professional staff Ms Sue Ball, Ms Angela Kousourakis and Ms Elena Shcherbak for their continuing support. We heartily welcome our TAs and are confident they are going to contribute towards our Department's goal of teaching excellence. We wish all of them a great semester!

Professor Sascha Becker co-organised the inaugural ASREC Australasia Conference at Monash Business School, on the 23^rd and 24^th of March 2023, together with Associate Professor Jeanet Bentzen from the University of Copenhagen. The inaugural speaker was Professor Pauline Grosjean from University of New South Wales.

Prof Becker also gave four seminars in January 2023. He presented at the Luxembourg School of Religion and Society and at the University of Luxembourg. In Germany he also presented at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität in Bonn and at the Humboldt University in Berlin.

In February, he presented at the Australasian Public Choice Conference (APCC) in Perth.

Dr Mita Bhattacharya took part in the following workshop at the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai in December 2022: 'Renewables and Net-Zero Targets: Current status for Australia and India'.

Melbourne Trade workshop

Associate Professor Laura Puzello organised the 6^th Melbourne trade workshop on December 5 2022 which was held in person at Monash Business School.

The workshop was jointly organised by Monash Business School and the Trade and Development unit at The University of Melbourne. This year’s featured speakers were Mary Amiti from New York Federal Reserve, Associate Professor Bingjing Li  from Hong Kong University and Professor Frederic Warzynski from Aarhus University.

There were between 16-20 participants per session, great speakers and discussants, and active participants from ANU, RMIT and Swinburne. Monash PhD students and other departments’ members participated. Talks provided insights on firms' expansion strategies, the US-China trade war and its effect on countries’ income and welfare, and multinationals R&D activity in South Korea.

Gender workshop

On March 17 The Department of Economics organized a mini department workshop on Gender. The aim was to bring together colleagues and PhD students who work on topics relating to gender using different kinds of data and methods (lab experiments, field experiments, observational data and theory). The event was a huge success.

The organising committee comprised Dr Solmaz Moslehi, Professor Pushkar Maitra and Dr Jaai Parasnis.

Associate Professor Michelle Rendall assisted in organising the VAMS Workshop at the University of Sydney from Dec 12-13 2022. Her colleagues on the committee were Dr Elena Capatina (ANU), Dr James Graham (USyd), and Dr Satoshi Tanaka (UQ). Financial support for this workshop was  generously provided by the University of Sydney, the Australian National University, and Monash University.

Professor Yves Zenou was elected Foreign Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (class for social sciences). On 6-7 March he also gave two seminars at the University of Sydney and University of Technology Sydney.

MonLEE

During Orientation Week in Semester 1, Monash Laboratory for Experimental Economics (MonLEE) organized a two-day special event. Our MonLEE managers Mike Wu and Zhongwen Chen created a coffee mug “relay race” (students got free coffee mugs once they invited their friends to sign up for MoneLEE) as an incentive device to recruit subjects. The recruitment was a great success. 286 students and staff registered as new users. Moreover, 35 students experienced an economic experiment in VR under the technical support from the e-Solution team.

On March 17, MonLEE offered a full-day excursion for 28 high school students from John Monash Science School to Clayton campus where Amy Newman (a senior student recruitment coordinator) at Monash Business School first provided an overview about the Monash Business School, as well as student life at Monash University, followed by MonLEE staff’s short introduction of behavioral economics. Dr Birendra Rai also kindly provided an introduction of experimental economics (frontier research topics and methodologies) and shared his personal experience of the transition from engineering background to economic science.

Prof Sascha Becker is organising the 5th Monash-Warwick-Zurich “Text as Data” workshops on 3 and 4 April, with A/Prof Elliott Ash from ETH Zurich.

On 19– 22 April, Professor Kaveh Majslesi will organise the “CEPR Eighth European Workshop on Household Finance”. CEPR, the flagship organisation in Europe for economic research and policy, holds an annual workshop that consists of an event with industry partners followed by a few days of discussion and presentation of academic papers. It has always been held in Europe, but this year it will be held in Australia for the first time, on behalf of the Monash Business School.

Associate Professor Simon Angus was interviewed by the ABC on the battle to keep the internet up and running in the Ukraine amidst Russian attacks.

Dr Gennadi Kazakevitch featured in the West Australian on the elimination of industries in Australia in favour of cheap imports and international supply chains.

As always, there are many awards to celebrate at this time of year.

First, congratulations to Associate Professor Xiaojian Zhao for receiving the Dean's Award for Excellence in Research 2022.

And to Dr Anupama Sethi for a Dean's Citation for Outstanding Contribution to Student Learning.

Further, we congratulate Professors Sascha Becker and Russell Smyth on being elected to the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA). In total, 34 leading scholars in the social sciences were elected this year.

Dr Zac Gross has been awarded the Vice-Chancellor's Citation For Outstanding Contributions To Student Learning – Early Career. See the full list of awardees.

Congratulations to Zac for this well deserved recognition!

Associate Professor Simon Angus and colleagues have received the 2022 Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC) Award for Innovation and Excellence in Research. The annual Network Awards recognise and reward innovation and excellence in Australian business schools, highlighting the sector’s positive social impact and contribution. Congratulations.

Professors Kaveh Majslesi and Paul Raschky have been named top researchers in the fields of Economics and Development Economics by the Australian Research Magazine.

Also, Professor Majslesi’s paper “Cultural Origins of Investment Behavior” was chosen as the “Best Paper in Asset Pricing and Investments” (one of the two categories of awards, the other being corporate finance) at the Financial Management Association Asia-Pacific Conference 2022 that was held at Monash Business School between 11–13 December.

This year’s Christmas lunch was held at the Bleakhouse Hotel in Albert Park on December 14th. It was a great day with 60 staff, PhD students and visitors attending.

Professor Yves Zenou took part in the UNSW-UQ Economic Theory Festival: Bounded Rationality, Information and Markets in Sydney on December 5–6, 2022. He also presented at the departmental seminar, University of New South Wales in Sydney on December 7, 2022.

Further, he took part in a workshop on social networks at the Fondation de Treilles outside Nice in France on November 7–12, 2022.

Associate Professor Simon Angus was interviewed about internet access in Iran.

Associate Professor Guillaume Roger contributed to an article on energy bills in the New Daily.

The latest series of Monash Business School podcast “Thought Capital” on climate change features amongst others Associate Professors Anke LeRoux and Guillaume Roger from the Department of Economics.

Congratulations to Professor Zhijun Chen, Associate Professor Laura Puzello, and Associate Professor Paulo Santos on their recent promotions!

Professor Erte Xiao was elected as Asia-Pacific regional vice-president of ESA (Economic Science Association).

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Associate Professor Guillaume Roger is supervising postdoctoral students, Sergei Balakin and Ningyi Sun. They are funded by an ARENA grant and with contributions from the Grid Innovation Hub. Welcome!

Senior lecturer Mita Bhattacharya presented a paper titled 'Outsourcing Efficiency of Power Plant Operation in the US', at the Annual Conference organized by Western Economic Association International., June 29, 2022.

Online workshop

The 4th Monash-Warwick-Zurich Text-as-Date workshop took place online in early September. It was organised by Associate professor Elliott Ash (ETH Zurich) and Professor Sascha O. Becker.

Social inclusion and diversity in Economics

From left: Solmaz Moslehi; Riki Polygenis; Stoja Andric; Isabelle Layton.

Moderator Solmaz Moslehi with panelist Riki Polygenis.

The Women in Economics Network Victoria and the Department of Economics at Monash University organised a panel discussion and Q&A on Social Inclusion and Diversity in Economics on August 16. The session was moderated by Senior Lecturer Solmaz Moslehi.

This session explored career pathways that students with different socioeconomic backgrounds can take after studying Economics or related disciplines. The event featured a panel discussion of inclusive and diverse careers in economics and a Q&A with the panellists, who shared their different career journeys. Students also had the opportunity to meet our panellists in our post-panel networking session. The event was part of Learning and Teaching Committee’s activities.

Panellists included:

• Riki Polygenis, Assistant Secretary of the Financial and Monetary Policy Branch at Commonwealth Treasury.
• Stoja Andric, Senior Project Manager, Victorian Department of Education and Training.
• Isabelle Layton, Senior Policy Advisor in the Victorian Department of Jobs, Precincts and Regions.

Sascha Becker

The Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung covered Professor Sascha Becker’s research on forced migration ("uprootedness hypothesis") in their June 5 edition.

Mita Bhattacharya

Senior lecturer Mita Bhattacharya was interviewed by Monash Impact on the topic of energy supply and energy poverty in Australia: “Australia finally sees the danger as energy poverty risk looms.”

Lionel Frost

Associate Professor Lionel Frost was featured in Monash Lens on the topic of water resilient cities: “Tapping into Aboriginal knowledge to create a water-resilient future for Australia's cities.”

Ranjan Ray

Professor Ranjan Ray took part in the Monash University podcast “A different lens” on the topic of  “The Shifting Sands of Global Power” – Is the world more dangerous now than it’s ever been? Listen here.

Congratulations to Professor Zhijun Chen, Associate Professor Laura Puzello, and Associate Professor Paulo Santos on their recent promotions!

Professor Erte Xiao was elected as Asia-Pacific regional vice-president of ESA (Economic Science Association).

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Dr Mita Bhattacharya has been awarded a grant for the 'Decision Engine to Support the Path to Net Zero', CRC-P project, under the RACE2030 program, with Mark Wallace from Monash University, Jahangir Hossain from the University Technology of Sydney, and Atiq Zaman from CurtinUniversity.

Dr Mallory Avery and Professor Andreas Leibbrandt have together with Jeffrey Flory from Claremont McKenna College, USA, received US$100,000 funding from the Russell Sage Foundation for their project "Does Work from Home Work for Diversity? Evidence From a Field Experiment"

Ass. Professor Wayne Geerling is presenting  the lecture “Using Squid Game to Teach Game Theory” at the TeachECONference 2022 at the Centre for Teaching and Learning Excellence, University City London in June 2022.

He has also co-created a new website devoted to the same topic: www.economicsofsquidgame.com

Professor Yves Zenou is presenting at the ‘Lunch seminar TOM (Theory, Organisation and Markets)’ at Paris School of Economics in Paris, France on June 1, 2022.

And at the ‘Labour and public economics seminar’, Paris School of Economics, Paris, June 2, 2022.

Monash Lecture series in Behavioural economics

In 2022, Monash Lecture Series in Behavioural Economics continues to invite leading scholars to give online lectures on some frontier topics in the field of behavioural and experimental economics.

This year, we have successfully delivered two lectures by Roland Benabou on “Beliefs and Misbeliefs: The Economics of Wishful Thinking” and David Rand on “The Psychology of Fake News”. The recorded lectures are available on YouTube.

Department of Economics Careers Panel

The Careers Panel was held on the 23rd of March to a full auditorium. It was organised in partnership with the Graduate Development Team and was very successful. The speakers showcased the diversity in careers paths and highlighted that economists come from diverse backgrounds and the students had the opportunity to ask questions.

Ass. Professor Wayne Geerling has presented the following lectures:

“Economics Education Research: What I Do And Why It Matters”, Business Education Research Group (BERG) Symposium (February 2022).

“Finding Innovative Ways to Engage Your Students In Era 4.0”, Monash Business School Deep Dive (February 2022).

“Using Squid Game to Teach Game Theory”, Wiley Webinar (February 2022).

“Using Squid Game to Teach Game Theory”, Robert Morris University Teaching Conference, Pittsburgh, America February 2022).

“Making the ‘Dismal Science’ Less Dismal Through Experiential Learning”, Monash Education Academy (March 2022).

“Teaching in the 4.0 Era: The Use of Media in the Classroom”, Guangzhou University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou, China (March 2022).

“Teaching in the 4.0 Era: The Use of Media in the Classroom”, Technische Hochschule Deggendorf, Germany (March 2022).

Professor Yves Zenou presented at the AME Labour Economics Seminar, Swedish Institute for Social Research (SOFI), Stockholm, Sweden on May 5, 2022. And the Departmental Seminar at the Carey Business School, Johns Hopkins University (online) on April 27, 2022.

Finally, his presentation on early childhood was delivered at the Victorian Treasury's New Directions in Economic Policy seminar series on 12 April 2022.

Professor Sascha O. Becker has been appointed as member of theBoard of Editors at the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics.

Simon Angus, Klaus Ackerman, Paul Raschky

The research of A/Professor Simon Angus, Dr Klaus Ackerman and Professor Paul Raschky from the Monash IP Observatory has been featured in Monash Lens: “Cyberwar: Keeping track of the battle to keep Ukraine online”

Sascha Becker

Professor Sascha Becker was interviewed by Tim Phillips on the Vox/CEPR podcast about his research on the economic impact of mass displacement in history, both on refugees and communities.

Listen to the full episode here.

He was also interviewed by The real Jason Duncan in an episode on YouTube called  “Leaving your company in good hands - the root of all success” .

Mita Bhattacharya

Dr Mita Bhattacharya’s research on the use of end-of-life-tyres titled 'From dead tyres to liquid fuels',  was published in 'Sustainability Matters' with co-authors from the Faculty of Engineering. This research was funded by the Tyre Stewardship.

Wayne Geerling

Ass. Professor Wayne Geerling’s article “Squid pro quo: using Squid Game to engage economics students”, was published in ‘The Campus Times Higher Education’.

Yew-Kwang Ng

Professor Yew-Kwang Ng was interviewed by SBS Radio's Mandarin program on the current Federal Election.

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Stefanie Fischer and Corey White

Dr Stefanie Fischer and Dr Corey White discussed abortions and the new restrictive abortion bans in Texas in The New York Times.

Wayne Geerling

A/Prof Wayne Geerling has done a series of interviews to promote his new working paper: “Using Squid Game to Teach Game Theory” (ABC, 3AW, Herald Sun; 7News TV: AusBiz).

The story has been picked up by dozens of media outlets worldwide and been translated into Bahasa-Indonesian, Italian and Vietnamese.

Claudio Labanca

Dr Claudio Labanca appeared on the Monash University podcast, What Happens Next? to speak about the effects of migration on the labour market opportunities of native workers.

Further, he discussed his research on the labour market effects of the migration induced by the Arab Spring uprisings on the academic Faculti platform.

Ranjan Ray

Professor Ranjan Ray was interviewed by Social Science Encyclopedia on aspects of his policy driven research on India.

Social Science Encyclopedia is well known internationally for publishing books in the area of Social Science. They have recently started a new web-based initiative featuring recorded interviews with internationally renowned researchers.

Professor Raj’s research on “Goods and Services tax: Estimating Optimal rates” with Dr Amita Majumder and Associate Professor Sattwik Santra was featured in Ideas for India.

Professor Raj was also interviewed on the research platform Faculti about his work on Covid-19.

Paul Raschky

Professor Paul Raschky was named Field Leader in Development Economics by The Australian Research Magazine.

Liang Choon Wang

The research of Associate Professor Liang Choon Wang and Professor Yves Zenou on "Gender inequality and caste: Field experiment evidence from India" was featured in Ideas for India.

Yves Zenou

Yves Zenou was also named Field Leader in Economics and Economic Policy by The Australian Research Magazine.

The 33^rd PhD Conference in Economics and Business

The 33^rd PhD Conference in Economics and Business, organised by Prof Pushkar Maitra, was held online in November. The conference included 160 registered participants, 30 presenters from 20 universities and discussants from 10 universities. Panel discussions were organised and moderated by Prof Ranjan Ray, Prof Stephen King and Monash Business School Head, Prof Simon Wilkie.

MEEW21

Monash Environmental Economics workshop MEEW21 was held on November 23-24^th 2021.

The 2021 Monash Environmental Economics Workshop, organised by our Energy, Environment and Resource Economics Research Group and jointly hosted by the Department of Economics and CDES, was again a great success.

In its fifth iteration, MEEW took on a hybrid format featuring keynotes by A/Prof Lana Friesen (UQ) and Ms Susan Madden (Murray Darling Basin Authority and NSW Assistant Commissioner for Natural Resources) as well as a jam-packed program across energy, environment and natural resource economics topics. With over 70 online and in-person participants the excitement to reconnect and discuss research with colleagues across Australia after the long lock-down was palpable.

Australasian development economics workshop

On 25-26 November,  the 16^th annual Australasian Development Economics Workshop was held in a hybrid format, sponsored by the Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

SEEDEC

The Symposium on Economic experiments in developing countries (SEEDEC) was co-hosted by FAIR at the Norwegian School of Economics and the Department of Economics at Monash Business School on 7 October, 2021.

The ninth annual SEEDEC symposium brought together a community of scholars who employ laboratory experimental methods for research in low and middle-income countries.

Monash Lecture series in Behavioural economics

The department of Economics initiated the Monash Lecture Series in Behavioural Economics which aims to invite leading scholars to give online lectures on some frontier topics in the field of behavioural and experimental economics.

In 2021, we successfully delivered three lectures by John List on “Voltage Effect”, Colin Camerer on “Individual Behaviour and Game Theory” and Juan Carrillo on “Neuroeconomic Theory”. The recorded lectures are available on Youtube.

In 2022, we will have Prof Roland Benabou from Princeton University to kick off the lecture series on 15 March, 9-11am.

Prof Sascha Becker has joined the Editorial Board of the /Journal of Economic
History (JEH).

Prof  Becker also gave a keynote lecture at the 5th annual conference of the
Asian and Australasian Society of Labour Economics (AASLE) held at Peking University on 9-11 December, 2021.

He also presented his paper “Scholars at Risk: Academic networks and High-skilled emigration from Nazi Germany at Osaka University in Japan (online) on 6 December, 2021.

At the University of British Columbia in Vancouver Prof Becker gave a talk (online) on “Shallow Christianity and the rise of Hitler” on 1 October, 2021.

On 21September 2021 he presented a research paper at the Institute for International Economic Studies in Stockholm.

Finally, on 9January, Prof Becker spent from 2am- 4am Melbourne time presenting a paper and discussing another paper at the (online) Allied Social Science Associations (ASSA) meetings.

Prof Yves Zenou presented a paper at the Asian-Pacific Industrial Organization Society (APIOS) Conference (online), National University of Singapore, 13-14 December, 2021

He also held the Theory Seminar (online) at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, on 24 September, 2022.

Dr Claudio Labanca is co-organizing the inaugural workshop in Empirical Public Economics with Australian National University (ANU). This event, which will be hosted by the Tax and Transfer Policy Institute in Canberra on March 18 and 19, will bring together scholars and policy makers to discuss current issues and research in public economics.

This workshop is the first one of this type to be organized in Australia. It will set the seeds for a new community of researchers in public economics, and it will provide a great opportunity for our colleagues to showcase their research to policy makers, thus increasing its impact.

The keynote speaker is Professor Claus Thustrup Kreiner, of the Center for Economic Behaviour and Inequality, Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen. Professor Thustrup Kreiner is co-editor of the Journal of Public Economics and an expert on the use of large administrative datasets for research and policy insight.

Sascha Becker delivered the 2021 Noel Butlin Public Lecture at the Asia-Pacific Business and Economic History Conference at the University of Western Australia in February. The title of Sascha's lecture was 'Forced Displacement in History'. The conference and public lecture are annual events hosted by the Economic History Society of Australia and New Zealand. Lionel Frost is current President of the Society.

Professor Sascha Becker gave the Noel Butlin Lecture at the Asia Pacific Economic and Business History Conference 2021, (virtually) in Perth, on 11 Feb 2021.

Senior Lecturer Michelle Rendall gave a talk at The Oxford University Business Economics Programme on technology innovation, inequalities and gender (https://oubep.econ.ox.ac.uk/oubep_seminars/technology-innovation-inequalities-and-gender/)

Professor Yves Zenou gave the keynote speech at the Economic Society of Uruguay (SEU) annual meeting on December 23, 2020.

He also gave a seminar talk at the Cambridge-INET Networks Webinar Series on November 27, 2020 and a seminar talk at the New Zealand Economics eSeminar Series on November 13, 2020.

Finally, Professor Zenou participated in the Monthly Applied Economics Webinar, HKUST, NUS, Taiwan National, and University of Tokyo on February 25 2021.

Professor Sascha Becker wrote a piece in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung entitled “How religion shaped Economic history” with colleagues Jared Rubin and and Ludger Wössmann.

He and Marco Lecci have also started a new Economics podcast called GrowthChat where they cover topics in Economic growth and Economic History.

They interview Economists and other social scientists about their recent research papers and publications. The aim of the podcast is to share the invaluable work that researchers do, making it accessible to the general public and students, independently of their background and preparation.

So far seven interviews have been recorded and are available on Spotify, YouTube and Itunes. New episodes will be released every ten days.

Thought Capital

A new season of the Monash Business School podcast Thought Capital, 'Connecting the dots of COVID-19', is out now.

Participants in this season include Monash Business School Head Professor Simon Wilkie, former Dean Professor Stephen King, Adjunct Professor Tony Venables, Associate Professor Giovanni Caggiano, Associate Professor Gaurav Datt and Associate professor He-Ling Shi and a number of other colleagues from across the Business School.

You can find Thought Capital on Spotify, Itunes or wherever you listen to podcasts.

• In a recent paper called 'Geographic diversity in economic publishing' by Associate Professor Simon Angus, Associate Professor Kadir Atalay from University of Sydney, Associate Professor Jonathan Newton from Kyoto University and Senior Lecturer David Ubilava from University of Sydney, it is shown that Monash University has the highest concentration of editorial power in the 'rest of the world' meaning outside North America and Europe.
  
  The authors say: "The most powerful institution in the world outside of North America and Europe, Monash University, is only as powerful as the 32nd most powerful institution in North America, but would rank 8th if it were located in Europe."

• On that note, we are happy to announce that Professor Sascha Becker has been appointed Associate Editor at the Journal of the European Association, from 1 Jan 2021.
  
  He was also elected to the Executive Board of the Asian & Australasian Society of Labour Economics.

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Simon Angus, Paul Raschky

Associate Professor Simon Angus, Professor Paul Raschky and Dr Klaus Ackermann (EBS) of the Monash IP Observatory, have contributed data and insights to more internet shutdown reporting around the world:

• Anatomy of a crackdown
• The draconian rise of internet shutdowns

Gaurav Datt

Up to 94 per cent of households in India’s third-largest state, Bihar, have been adversely affected by the pandemic, according to 'Lives and Livelihoods in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic in rural Bihar' a joint study by Associate Professor Gaurav Datt (CDES, Monash University), Dr. Swati Dutta and Dr. Sunil K. Mishra (Institute for Human Development, India). This was widely covered in the media including Le Monde, New Indian Express, The Economic Times, countercurrents.org, News18, The Hindu, Business Today, Gulf News and The Logical Indian .

Vinod Mishra

Associate Professor Vinod Mishra was quoted in the news story on SBS News on the "Rethinking Permanent Skilled Migration" report by Grattan Institute.

A SBS Hindi News story featured Dr Mishra’s views on the recommendations of Joint Parliamentary Committee's final report on skilled migration.

A panel of students on the Academic Affairs Committee have selected Associate Professor Wayne Geerling as the deserving recipient of the Faculty Teaching Award (Business & Economics Faculty). The award is for academic staff members who have provided outstanding teaching in each faculty, creating a better learning experience for students.

Over the course of 2021, Dr Geerling has been nominated by many students. Here are some of the reasons his nominations stood out to the panel:

• Keeping students engaged by using clips, music videos and game shows during the teaching.
• In particular, the use of the inquisitive and Kahoot programs in helping students grasp modern technology theory.
• His continued enthusiasm in a time where students needed it as well as an ability to adapt to teaching in lockdown and empathising with his students’ situations.
• Encouraging students to prioritise their mental health and reassuring them of available support.
• Organising social events during lockdown in a time where students were vulnerable to isolation and loneliness.

It was no easy task for the panel to pick winners from hundreds of staff members who have worked tirelessly this year in extraordinary circumstances, yet the comments made by students about his teaching in 2021 stood out a perfect embodiment of what they set out to recognise.

Associate Professor Geerling also received a purple letter for ECC1000 in semester 1, 2021. These are awarded to the top performing units in the student evaluations of teaching (SETUs). Congratulations!

Sascha Becker

Professor Sascha Becker presented the paper "Scholars at Risk: Academic Networks and High-Skilled Emigration from Nazi Germany" at the University of Goettingen in the Netherlands on 21June and on 22June at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Israel.

He also presented the paper "Shallow Christianity and the Rise of Hitler" at the Ifo Institute at the University of Munich, Germany on 5August. All presentations by Zoom.

Mita Bhattacharya

The paper 'Energy productivity across different regions: Drivers and convergence analysis', by Ms Sidker Arjita, Dr Mita Bhattacharya and Dr John Inekwe was presented at WEA International, a virtual presentation by Ms. Sidker Arjita.

Wayne Geerling

Associate Professor Geerling ran an online teaching webinar with G. Dirk Mateer from the University of Texas: "Engaging Your Economics Students in All Modalities" on 21 July.

He also gave a keynote address: "Teaching Economics in English to ESL Students in the 4.0 Era: The Use of Media in the Classroom" at the Language Teaching and Learning in the 4.0 Era: Opportunities, Challenges and Strategies conference at Ha Noi University of Science and Technology, on 28 July.

Dr Geeling delivered an online seminar: "Breaking Down the Language Barrier: Using Pop Culture from Across the Globe to Teach Microeconomics", at the Developments in Economics Education Conference in Edinburgh on 2 September.

He will deliver an online seminar: "Diversifying the Use of Pop Culture in the Classroom: K-Pop Music" at the University of City London CTaLE Seminar, in London on 28 September.

Claudio Labanca

On August 26 and 27, a team of Dr Victoria Baranov (Melbourne University), Dr Claudio Labanca (Monash Economics) and Dr Denni Tomaasi (Monash EBS) organised and hosted the 23rd edition of the Labour Econometrics Workshop.

This workshop provides an opportunity for researchers in labour economics and applied econometrics to share and discuss their latest research. The workshop is the major conference for labour studies in Australia and it is hosted by a different Australian university each year. This year the virtual event was co-hosted by Monash Business School and the University of Melbourne. This was the first time the event had been hosted at Monash University since its inception 23 years ago. The conference featured keynote speeches by Professor Gordon Dahl from UC San Diego and Professor Kelsey Jack from UC Santa Barbara. More details on the event (including videos of the keynote talks) are available on the event website.

Guillaume Roger

Associate Professor Guillaume Roger was invited to testify at a Parliamentary Hearing on 6September held as part of the 'Inquiry into the current circumstances, and the future need and potential for dispatchable energy generation and storage capability in Australia'. He spoke about the economics of storage, and specifically about how little we know about it and how much work is required.

Xiaojian Zhao

Monash Laboratory for Experimental Economics (MonLEE) is organising the 2021 Monash Zoom Mini-Workshop of Motivated Beliefs on 30 October. Learn more and register now.

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• In a recent paper called 'Geographic diversity in economic publishing' by Associate Professor Simon Angus, Associate Professor Kadir Atalay from University of Sydney, Associate Professor Jonathan Newton from Kyoto University and Senior Lecturer David Ubilava from University of Sydney, it is shown that Monash University has the highest concentration of editorial power in the 'rest of the world' meaning outside North America and Europe.
  
  The authors say: "The most powerful institution in the world outside of North America and Europe, Monash University, is only as powerful as the 32nd most powerful institution in North America, but would rank 8th if it were located in Europe."

• On that note, we are happy to announce that Professor Sascha Becker has been appointed Associate Editor at the Journal of the European Association, from 1 Jan 2021.
  
  He was also elected to the Executive Board of the Asian & Australasian Society of Labour Economics.

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Eight candidates from the department of Economics were successful in being promoted this year. Two to the highest (E) level. The department wishes to congratulate all staff promoted this year.

• Associate Professor Arthur Campbell was promoted to Professor.
• Associate professor Paul Raschky was promoted to Professor.
• Senior Lecturer Wayne Geerling was promoted to Associate Professor.
• Lecturer Ayushi Bajaj was promoted to Senior Lecturer.
• Lecturer Gordon Leslie was promoted to Senior Lecturer.
• Lecturer Xiaodong Fan was promoted to Senior Lecturer.
• Scholarly Teaching Fellow Dr Anupama Sethi was promoted to Lecturer.
• Scholarly Teaching Fellow Dr Kris Ivanoski was promoted to Lecturer.

Professor Sascha Becker

Professor Becker gave zoom seminars at Harvard University on the 11th of March and at Northwestern University. on the 5th of May 2021.

He also gave his first face-to-face seminar in more than 12 months, at
QUT Brisbane on the 8th of April 2021.

Mita Bhattacharya

Senior lecturer Mita Bhattacharya presented a paper entitled 'Drivers of energy poverty in the ASEAN+6 region (Australia, the People's Republic of China, India, Japan, Korea and New Zealand): Evidence from nonparametric estimates across countries' (co-authored with John Inekwe and Eric Yan), at the WEAI conference, Virtual Platform, on 18 March.

In conjunction with the Faculty of Engineering, Dr Bhattacharya recently completed a report on the assessment of liquid fuel, chemicals, and porous material production from the end-of-life tyres for the Tyre Stewardship Australia.

The techno-economic work concludes that subject to the right policy setting, a 60 tonne per day processing plant will become cash-positive in four years with about 80 cents per litre oil production cost while avoiding these from going to landfill.

A dedicated supply chain needs to exist to make pyrolysis plants viable at defined locations. Also, defined regulatory policies in support of the pyrolysis process will facilitate the introduction of pyrolysis plants which are technically not complicated.

Giovanni Caggiano

Professor Caggiano is due to give talks at the following universities:

• 12 August 2021 at Queensland University of Technology.
• 27 August 2021 at Auckland University of Technology.
• 1 September 2021 at Macquarie University.

He was also a speaker on the 8-9 April 2021 at the Applied Time Series Workshop, Federal Reserve of St Louis.

Lionel Frost

From the 26th of March to the 5th of April, Associate Professor Lionel Frost was part of a panel discussion on A new suburban ambition – the past and future of the Australian suburb, organised by MADA as part of Melbourne Design Week.

Gennadi Kazakevitch

Dr Kazakevitch now has a regular weekly (Monday) Economic News segment on Radio SBS (Russian). This is the link to the most recent one.

Kushneel Prakash

Dr Kushneel Prakash is the recipient of the 2020 Mollie Holman award for best doctoral thesis completed in the Faculty of Business and Economics. His thesis is entitled 'Three Essays on Subjective Wellbeing' and his supervisor is Professor Russell Smyth. Dr Prakash is now at the Melbourne Institute.

Ranjan Ray

Professor Ray presented a paper (written jointly with Parvin Singh) entitled "Regionally Disaggregated Estimates of Global Income Inequality with Evidence on Sensitivity to Purchasing Power Parity" at the World Congress of the International Economic Association (IEA). The IEA World Congress was scheduled to be held in Bali last year but was postponed to this year due to COVID-19 and is being held online. A link to the recording that has been uploaded on the IEA website. Parvin Singh did her master's degree in Economics from Monash. The full Conference programme is available on the IEA website.

Dr Udeni De Silva Perera recently completed her PhD thesis under the joint supervision of Professor Brett Inder (from EBS as her primary supervisor) and Professor Ranjan Ray (from Economics as her Associate supervisor). Her thesis is entitled, 'Essays On Child Growth In Sri Lanka: An Empirical Analysis Of The Effects Of Sectors, Interventions And Natural Disasters'. She received her PhD degree at a Convocation held in May that both Professor Inder and Professor Ray attended. Congratulations to Dr Udeni de Silva Perera.

Michelle Rendall

Senior lecturer Dr Michelle Rendall gave a seminar at Melbourne Institute on 14 May on 'Gender and Disadvantage in the Evolution of Test Score Gaps' (with Dr Jaai Parasnis and Dr Molly Paterson).

Yves Zenou

Professor Yves Zenou gave the keynote lecture at the 19^th International Workshop on "Spatial Econometrics and Statistics" in Nantes, France (online) on 31May.

He also delivered a departmental seminar (online) at the University of Antwerp on 28 April and at the University of Ottawa on 26 March.

Lionel Frost

Associate Professor Lionel Frost was interviewed on ABC Radio Grandstand, as part of the AFL's Sir Doug Nicholls Round that recognises the contribution of Indigenous Australians. Dr Frost spoke about his research on the formation of the AFL's Racial Vilification Code.

He was also featured in Monash Lens, “How First Nations AFL players worked to fight racial vilification on and off the field.”

Wayne Geerling

Associate Professor Wayne Geerling spoke to Monash impact on the topic of using popular culture in teaching Economics.

Vinod Mishra

Associate Professor Vinod Mishra was featured in the SBS news story on 11 May regarding Australia’s Federal budget 2021.

He also gave his response to the Prime Minister's comments that opening international borders is not his immediate priority. On SBS on 12 May.

Further, a news story in Deutsche Welle (DW) Hindi edition quoted his views on the Australian prime minister's appeal that workers should return to offices now.

Ranjan Ray

Professor Ranjan Ray’s report on how the pandemic has affected some economies more than others has appeared in Monash Impact.

Yves Zenou

Professor Yves  Zenou was featured In Monash Impact on Social Networks and Political Opinions.

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• In a recent paper called 'Geographic diversity in economic publishing' by Associate Professor Simon Angus, Associate Professor Kadir Atalay from University of Sydney, Associate Professor Jonathan Newton from Kyoto University and Senior Lecturer David Ubilava from University of Sydney, it is shown that Monash University has the highest concentration of editorial power in the 'rest of the world' meaning outside North America and Europe.
  
  The authors say: "The most powerful institution in the world outside of North America and Europe, Monash University, is only as powerful as the 32nd most powerful institution in North America, but would rank 8th if it were located in Europe."

• On that note, we are happy to announce that Professor Sascha Becker has been appointed Associate Editor at the Journal of the European Association, from 1 Jan 2021.
  
  He was also elected to the Executive Board of the Asian & Australasian Society of Labour Economics.

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The Dean's Award for Excellence in Teaching is awarded to Associate Professor Vinod Mishra and Associate Professor Simon Angus as part of the Directors of Education team.

The Dean's Citation for outstanding contribution to Student Learning is attributed to Dr Claudio Labanca and Dr Kris Ivanovski.

Senior Lecturer Ratbek Dzhumashev has been awarded the Empirical Economics Lawrence R. Klein Award for outstanding papers in the field of Empirical Economics.

This biannual prize is awarded for the best paper published in the journal Empirical Economics. The Empirical Economics Springer prize was awarded for the first time by Springer in 2006,and was renamed in honour of the Nobel prize winner Lawrence R. Klein in 2013.

The 2019/2020 Lawrence R. Klein Award goes to:

Abebe Hailemariam (Monash Uni), Ratbek Dzhumashev (Monash Uni) and Muhammad Shahbaz for the joint paper "Carbon emissions, income inequality and economic development" published in Empirical Economics (2020) 59:1139–1159.

Professor Sascha Becker has been appointed Associate Editor at the Quarterly Journal of Economics (QJE), the only QJE Associate Editor south of the Equator.

Senior Lecturer Michelle Rendall became a fellow of CEPR in January.

Dr Claudio Labanca is co-organizing the inaugural workshop in Empirical Public Economics with Australian National University (ANU). This event, which will be hosted by the Tax and Transfer Policy Institute in Canberra on March 18 and 19, will bring together scholars and policy makers to discuss current issues and research in public economics.

This workshop is the first one of this type to be organized in Australia. It will set the seeds for a new community of researchers in public economics, and it will provide a great opportunity for our colleagues to showcase their research to policy makers, thus increasing its impact.

The keynote speaker is Professor Claus Thustrup Kreiner, of the Center for Economic Behaviour and Inequality, Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen. Professor Thustrup Kreiner is co-editor of the Journal of Public Economics and an expert on the use of large administrative datasets for research and policy insight.

Sascha Becker delivered the 2021 Noel Butlin Public Lecture at the Asia-Pacific Business and Economic History Conference at the University of Western Australia in February. The title of Sascha's lecture was 'Forced Displacement in History'. The conference and public lecture are annual events hosted by the Economic History Society of Australia and New Zealand. Lionel Frost is current President of the Society.

Professor Sascha Becker gave the Noel Butlin Lecture at the Asia Pacific Economic and Business History Conference 2021, (virtually) in Perth, on 11 Feb 2021.

Senior Lecturer Michelle Rendall gave a talk at The Oxford University Business Economics Programme on technology innovation, inequalities and gender (https://oubep.econ.ox.ac.uk/oubep_seminars/technology-innovation-inequalities-and-gender/)

Professor Yves Zenou gave the keynote speech at the Economic Society of Uruguay (SEU) annual meeting on December 23, 2020.

He also gave a seminar talk at the Cambridge-INET Networks Webinar Series on November 27, 2020 and a seminar talk at the New Zealand Economics eSeminar Series on November 13, 2020.

Finally, Professor Zenou participated in the Monthly Applied Economics Webinar, HKUST, NUS, Taiwan National, and University of Tokyo on February 25 2021.

Professor Sascha Becker wrote a piece in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung entitled “How religion shaped Economic history” with colleagues Jared Rubin and Ludger Wössmann.

He and Marco Lecci have also started a new Economics podcast called GrowthChat where they cover topics in Economic growth and Economic History.

They interview Economists and other social scientists about their recent research papers and publications. The aim of the podcast is to share the invaluable work that researchers do, making it accessible to the general public and students, independently of their background and preparation.

So far seven interviews have been recorded and are available on Spotify, YouTube and Itunes. New episodes will be released every ten days.

Thought Capital

A new season of the Monash Business School podcast Thought Capital, 'Connecting the dots of COVID-19', is out now.

Participants in this season include Monash Business School Head Professor Simon Wilkie, former Dean Professor Stephen King, Adjunct Professor Tony Venables, Associate Professor Giovanni Caggiano, Associate Professor Gaurav Datt and Associate professor He-Ling Shi and a number of other colleagues from across the Business School.

You can find Thought Capital on Spotify, Itunes or wherever you listen to podcasts.

• In a recent paper called 'Geographic diversity in economic publishing' by Associate Professor Simon Angus, Associate Professor Kadir Atalay from University of Sydney, Associate Professor Jonathan Newton from Kyoto University and Senior Lecturer David Ubilava from University of Sydney, it is shown that Monash University has the highest concentration of editorial power in the 'rest of the world' meaning outside North America and Europe.
  
  The authors say: "The most powerful institution in the world outside of North America and Europe, Monash University, is only as powerful as the 32nd most powerful institution in North America, but would rank 8th if it were located in Europe."

• On that note, we are happy to announce that Professor Sascha Becker has been appointed Associate Editor at the Journal of the European Association, from 1 Jan 2021.
  
  He was also elected to the Executive Board of the Asian & Australasian Society of Labour Economics.

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