The Institute for Research on Socio-Economic Inequality (IRSEI) of the University of Luxembourg is pleased to announce that it will host the 6th Meeting of the Society for the Study of Economic Inequality (ECINEQ). The conference will be held at Campus Kirchberg from 13-15 July 2015. 

This conference aims to promote academic debate and the exchange of opinions regarding inequality, poverty, and other topics of common interest, and through this exchange encourage the worldwide dissemination of the results of academic research and practical experience in this field. ECINEQ sets high standards in both the selection of topics and debates, whether they cover theoretical issues, empirical analyses or the implementation of policies.

More than 220 participants will have the opportunity to present the results of their research during the conference, which is structured into three blocks of eight parallel sessions per day. Each session will have three presenters.

During the conference, three renowned researchers in the field of distributive analysis will give plenary lectures.

• 13 July, 17h15: Stephen Jenkins, London School of Economics, "To what extent has income inequality increased? Some data issues"
• 14 July, 16h00: Martin Ravallion, Georgetown University, "Inequality when effort matters"
• 15 Juliy, 15h45: Branko Milanovic, City University of New York, "The current trends in global inequality and their political implications"

About the speakers

Stephen Jenkins (London School of Economics)

Stephen Jenkins is Professor of Economic and Social Policy at the London School of Economics. He received his D.Phil in 1983 from the University of York, UK. He was Chair (President) of the Council for the International Association for Research on Income and Wealth 2006-8, and President of the European Society for Population Economics in 1998. Stephen Jenkins has wide-ranging substantive research interests in the analysis of the distribution of income and its redistribution through taxation, social security and the labour market.

Recent research includes work on trends in inequality and poverty measurement, income mobility and poverty dynamics, and labour supply and social security benefit receipt. Stephen is also interested in quantitative research methods for the analysis of income distribution in particular, and applied microeconometrics more generally, especially survival analysis. Stephen's publications have appeared in a wide range of international journals and edited volumes. His most recent books are The Great Recession and the Distribution of Household Incomes, Oxford University Press 2013 (co-edited with Andrea Brandolini, John Micklewright and Brian Nolan), and Changing Fortunes: Income Mobility and Poverty Dynamics in Britain, Oxford University Press 2011

Branko Milanovic (City University of New York)

Branko Milanovic is Presidential Professor at the City University of New York’s Graduate Center, as well as Senior Scholar at the Luxembourg Income Survey. He obtained his Ph.D. in economics at the University of Belgrade with a dissertation on income inequality in Yugoslavia. He was lead economist in the World Bank Research Department for almost 20 years and senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington (2003-2005). He held teaching appointments at the University of Maryland (2007-2013) and the School for Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University (1997-2007).

During his 25-year career as an economist, his main area of research has been income distribution at the worldwide level (as opposed to the distribution in one country or a group of countries). He is the author of  The Haves and the Have-Nots: A Brief and Idiosyncratic History of Global Inequality (2011) and numerous articles on the methodology and empirics of global inequality, and the effects of globalisation, poverty and social policy in transition economies.

Martin Ravallion (Georgetown University)

Martin Ravallion holds the Edmond D. Villani Chair of Economics at Georgetown University. Prior to joining Georgetown in December 2012 he was Director of the World Bank’s research department, the Development Research Group. He joined the Bank in 1988 and worked in almost all sectors and all regions over the following 24 years. Prior to joining the Bank, Martin was on the faculty of the Australian National University. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from the London School of Economics, and has taught economics at L.S.E., Oxford University, the Australian National University and Princeton University.

Martin’s main research interests over the last 25 years concern poverty and policies for fighting it. He has advised numerous governments and international agencies on this topic, and he has written extensively on this and other subjects in economics, including three books and 200 papers in scholarly journals and edited volumes. He currently serves on the Editorial Boards of ten economics journals, is a Senior Fellow of the Bureau for Research in Economic Analysis of Development, a Founding Council Member and President-elect of the Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research and a Non-Resident Fellow of the Center for Global Development.

About ECINEQ

The Society for the Study of Economic Inequality (ECINEQ) was founded in Palma de Mallorca in July 2005 as a not-for-profit association supporting the study of economic inequality and related fields. The aims of the Society are:

• To provide an international forum for all researchers interested in the study of economic inequality and related fields, bringing together the diversity of perspectives (theoretical and empirical, micro and macro, and so on);
• To improve the interaction between researchers, policy makers and all the actors interested in understanding the determinants as well as the implications of economic inequality and poverty.

ECINEQ has now over 200 members from more than seventy countries, affiliated with universities or the civil service.

About IRSEI

Founded in 2013 after a multi-million Euro grant from the Programme Excellence Award for Research in Luxembourg (PEARL) by the National Research Fund (FNR), the Institute for Research on Socio-Economic Inequality (IRSEI) focuses on a national research priority: the study of socio-economic inequality.

It aims to uncover the new processes of transformations of inequalities by means of demographic, economic, psychological as well as sociological analysis. Its members analyse the dynamics of the social replacement of generations, the complicated changing balance between earnings and wealth, competition between countries with different levels of inequalities and living standards in a globalised world.

It aims at a better understanding of individual well-being and socio-economic inequalities in Luxembourg, the Grande Region, and the 28 countries of the European Union in a globalised perspective. What is the reality of inequality in Luxembourg in the context of other comparable countries? Can we explain its particular situation inside the big picture of Western societies, and what are its causes and consequences?

Moreover, it wishes to attract interest in these topics from other Luxembourgish, European and international actors, such as students, the scientific community as well as civil society.