Thijs van Rens

University of Warwick, UK, and IZA, Germany

Writing for IZA World of Labor forced me to make my ideas easier to understand, without the technical luggage. This not only helped me to publicize my findings among a wider audience, but also provided a welcome challenge to focus on the big picture

IZA World of Labor role

Author

Current position

Associate Professor, University of Warwick, UK

Research interest

Unemployment, wages, inequality, economics of food and obesity

Positions/functions as a policy advisor

Academic Fellow, UK Parliament, 2017; Economist Visitor, DG Enterprise and Industry, European Commission, 2013; Consultant, Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), 2010–2011

Past positions

Junior Researcher and Adjunct Professor, Research Centre for International Economics (CREI), Universitat Pompeu Fabra, 2005–2012

Qualifications

PhD Economics, Princeton University, 2005

Selected publications

  • "Accounting for mismatch unemployment." Journal of the European Economic Association (Forthcoming) (with B. Herz).

  • "Selective hiring and welfare analysis in labor market models." Labour Economics 57 (2019): 117-130 (with C. Merkl).

  • "Wage rigidity and job creation." Journal of Monetary Economics 60:8 (2013) (with C. Haefke and M. Sonntag).

  • "Skill-biased technological change and the business cycle." Review of Economics and Statistics 95:4 (2013): 1222–1237 (with A. Balleer).

  • "Heterogeneous life-cycle profiles, income risk and consumption inequality." Journal of Monetary Economics 56:1 (2009): 20–39 (with G. Primiceri).