Welsh Institute For Research in Economics and Development

We aim to stimulate and build capacity in research relevant to the Welsh economy and society as well as to the wider world.

The Institute undertakes research and policy initiatives of particular relevance to Wales but also of more general interest to the UK, the rest of Europe, and the wider world.

We intend that our activities will benefit the political and business community of Wales, while providing a valuable stimulus to research and other joint activity for all the many established researchers and units working on Welsh issues.

Recent research topics have included:

taxation and devolution
research and development, innovation and entrepreneurship
language and trade
school effectiveness
economic growth and development
neural networks.

Illustrative Projects

Taxation and devolution

Foreman-Peck and Zhou develop an indirect approach to establishing lower bound revenue impacts of possible devolved tax changes by allowing for tax-induced migration. The results suggest that limited tax devolution, such as conferred on Wales by the UK 2014 Act, could trigger substantial tax revenue and gross value added (GVA) spillovers from migration on the devolved economy.

Devolving fiscal policy: migration and tax yields: Regional Studies: Vol 54, No 3 (tandfonline.com)

Submission to the Finance Committee of the National Assembly of Wales and minutes of the Finance Committee meeting on 04 March 2020 where evidence was given by Professor Foreman-Peck.

Research and development, innovation and entrepreneurship

Research and development effects can spillover both between firms and across industries. Leppala shows how the impact on innovation and output depends on the local industry structure. Depending on the spillover rates and the degree of product differentiation between the industries, the firms respond differently to changes in variety and concentration.

Innovation, Research and Development Spillovers, and the Variety and Concentration of the Local Industry Structure

School Effectiveness

The impact of school sixth form size on educational attainment of pupils at Key Stage 5, 2016 Welsh Government

The literature on school performance raises questions over the most effective size of a sixth form school and the potential negative impact on KS4 attainment in schools where small sixth forms may be subsidised from non-sixth form budgets. In light of the above concerns the Welsh Government commissioned an analysis of the impact of school sixth form size on educational attainment of pupils at Key Stage 5 (KS5), controlled for exam scores two years earlier (i.e. KS4).

Language and trade

Research and Development activities of emerging countries (EMEs) have increased considerably in recent years. Luintel’s analyses of regional clusters of EMEs do not support any role of language, culture or geographical characteristics in knowledge diffusion. Spillovers from the geographical proximity of the industrialized world are robust.

Ideas Production and International Knowledge Spillovers: Digging Deeper into Emerging Countries

Economic Growth and Development

In an empirical unified growth model Foreman-Peck and Zhou show that England’s escape from the Malthusian trap was triggered by the demographic catastrophes in the aftermath of the Black Death; household investment in children ultimately raised wages despite an increasing population; and rising human capital, combined with the increasing elasticity of substitution between child quantity and quality, reduced target family size and contributed to the fertility transition.

Fertility versus productivity: a model of growth with evolutionary equilibria

Neural networks

Neural networks are a series of algorithms that mimic the ability of a human brain to recognize relationships between vast amounts of data. Morgan and co-workers have used the approach to develop models of consumer loyalty as a key aspect of consumer behaviour.

NEURAL Networks and Consumer Behavior: NEURAL Models, Logistic Regression, and the Behavioral Perspective Model