Dear Members of the Verein für Socialpolitik,

As this year draws to a close, I would like to inform you for the last time as chair about current developments in our organisation.

We look back with gratitude and satisfaction on an exceptionally well-attended annual conference, which we were able to organise at the Technical University of Berlin with 855 participants. The local organising team (Dirk Engelmann and Radosveta Ivanova-Stenzel) as well as the core conference leader (Bernd Fitzenberger) and the open conference leader (Almut Balleer) together organised a very attractive setting for a great programme. We also managed financially to bridge the sudden loss of our largest single donor.

In 2024, the Management Board was intensively involved in negotiations to extend the contract with the publisher of our association journals. At the beginning of 2025 we will switch to a new publishing model - with generous financial support from the  ZBW. The articles of both the German Economic Review and the Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik will be made available on an open access basis. This should further increase the reach and visibility of the journals. The Association is also moving with the times in social media. We recently activated our account on BlueSky and will (initially) use this channel in addition to X and LinkedIn.

As my term of office comes to an end, I can look back on four eventful years on the Select and Extended Board, including the last two as chair. I would like to thank all my colleagues for their trusting and pleasant cooperation, without which such an association would not be possible. We have an excellent, practical and proactive team in the Association’s office who put in many, many hours of overtime for the benefit of the Association. I hope that in the future we will be able to alleviate some of the pressure by employing another part-time member of staff. I would like to thank Karolin von Normann and Claudia Schwartz for their great and dedicated work.

On 1 January 2025, Klaus Schmidt will take over the chairmanship of the Association and with him a new Board. The Association is in good hands! Please note that the next Annual Conference will take place at the University of Cologne from 14 to 17 September 2025; the theme could hardly be more topical: Revival of Industrial Policy. I look forward to meeting you in Cologne and wish you all a harmonious end of the year.

Best wishes,

Regina T. Riphahn
Chairwoman of the Verein für Socialpolitik

The European Economic Association (EEA) and its Minorities in Economics Committee recently published a report on the working climate in economics. It is based on a survey conducted in cooperation with the Code of Ethics working group of the Verein für Socialpolitik (VfS) and is modelled on an earlier study by the American Economic Association (AEA, Allgood et al. 2019). The target group of the survey, which was conducted at the beginning of 2024, were doctoral students, researchers and lecturers.

Similar to the AEA, the study shows clear gender differences in perceptions of the working climate in Europe. For example, 31% of male respondents rated the working climate in economics as positive, compared to only 15% of women. While 40% of men feel socially integrated in their professional field, only 22% of women feel the same. In addition, almost half of women said they had been treated unfairly because of their gender, compared with 12% of men. For example, women rate course evaluations, comments made during seminar presentations or the allocation of courses and administrative tasks as significantly less fair than men.

Similar patterns, although less pronounced, are seen among minorities. For example, ethnic minorities, LGBTIQ+ people, people with disabilities and ‚first generation academics‘ tend to be more critical of the professional climate.

While the group differences are similar, the overall assessment of the professional climate in Europe is more critical than in the AEA survey. However, there are also regional differences within Europe: the working climate is rated most favourably in northern European countries. The VfS is planning to analyse the data collected for German-speaking countries separately. We will keep you informed!

The VfS supports young economists. At the last annual conference there was therefore a whole range of activities aimed at young economists. Among other things, we once again offered a job market seminar, which provided assistance with the presentation of a research paper and many useful application tips. In addition to the VfS Economic Baccalaureate Prize, the association also offers a lecture award programme. The programme rewards the presentation of a paper at an internationally renowned conference. This year, 84 scientists were awarded a prize of 300 euros. Just before Christmas, the joy was naturally great. Many congratulations!

With the turn of the year, my term as VfS Young Scientist Representative comes to an end. I would like to thank the association for the trust they have placed in me and I am sure that my successor will be just as committed to promoting young talent.

For more than two years, the Verein für Socialpolitik has been working intensively on improving the legal basis for access to and linking of research data in Germany. A first draft of the Research Data Act was finally published in October. Andreas Peichl, Kerstin Schneider and Regina T. Riphahn commented on it in an opinion piece in the FAZ (1 November 2024) and submitted detailed comments to the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), which was responsible for the draft.
Unfortunately, the premature end of the traffic light coalition has dashed all hopes of a rapid improvement in this area. A research data law is no longer expected in this legislative period.
The Special Committee of the Association for Social Policy has extended the mandate of the Research Data Working Group (chaired by Regina T. Riphahn) for two years. The next step is to write to MEPs and political groups to remind them of the problems, because after the parliamentary term is before the parliamentary term. Now it is (again) a matter of getting the issue of modern data access into the party programmes and into the next coalition agreement. We are committed to creating the legal basis for empirical economic and social research in Germany to catch up with the data access standards of our neighbouring countries. Many thanks to all those who are involved and who ‚keep at it‘!

This year, elections were held for the Managing Board, the supplementary elections for the Executive Board and the election of the VfS auditors.
The election commission counted the votes - with the following results:

Managing Board (2025-2026)

• Designated Chair: Dorothea Kübler (WZB Berlin / TU Berlin)
• Vice Chair: Anja Schöttner (HU Berlin)
• Treasurer: Friedrich Breyer (em.)
• Secretary: Stefan Felder (Basel University)

Supplementary Elections for the Executive Board (2025-2028)

• Christine Harbring (RWTH Aachen)
• Matthias Schündeln (Goethe University Frankfurt)

Cash Auditors (2025-2026)

• Gunther Friedl (TU München)
• Jochen Hundsdörfer (FU Berlin)

We do thank all association’s members who took part in the election.

The chair of a VfS Standing Field Committees has changed in the last six months. The new chair is Tobias Seidel ( Committee on Regional and Urban Economics).

This year’s conference was held at the Technical University of Berlin from 15 to 18 September under the title Upcoming Labour Market Challenges. In three keynote speeches and a keynote panel, leading experts addressed regional inequalities, the role of women in the labour market and immigration, discussed the latest research findings and evaluated policy solutions.

In her keynote speech, Jessica Pan (NUS Singapore) started from the observation of persistent gender gaps in the labour market. These are even more in need of explanation as women today are better educated and better prepared for the labour market. In her keynote speech, she focused on explaining the persistent negative impact of children on women’s careers and provided new insights to explain aggregate gender inequality.

David Card (UC Berkeley, Laureate of the 2021 Nobel Prize in Economics) gave an overview of wage inequality within and across cities, based on ongoing work using new administrative data. He discussed the causes and consequences of these wage differentials, which have rarely been considered in a comprehensive way.

Christian Dustmann (University College London, RF Berlin) outlined the effects of immigration on the economy, the challenges of measuring these effects and the influence of immigration on political discourse.

These and similar questions were also addressed by a high-level panel at the core of the conference.

Many thanks to the 2024 conference chairs:

Almut Balleer (RWI Essen and TU Dortmund),
Chair of the Open Conference

Dirk Engelmann (HU Berlin),
Radosveta Ivanova-Stenzel (TU Berlin),
Heads:of the local organisation

Bernd Fitzenberger (IAB, FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg),
Head of the Core Conference

With 855 attendees, this year’s conference set a new attendance record. If you want to reminisce, here are some snapshots.
We would like to thank everyone who organised and contributed to the programme. A big thank you also goes to our supporters, sponsors and exhibitors.

In addition to the award ceremonies (see below), this year’s Johann Heinrich v. Thünen Lecture was one of the highlights of the conference. This year’s Thünen Lecture was given by Ottmar Edenhofer (PIK-Potsdam) on the topic “The (Missing) Third Pillar – Why climate policy needs to get serious about planetary waste management”.

A milestone in the development of the Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik is the move to open access in 2025, which will enable PWP to better fulfil its role as a bridge between academia and the public.

The current issue of PWP features several awards: Ottmar Edenhofer has written up his Johann Heinrich von Thünen Lecture on ‚Planetary waste collection - a game changer for climate policy? Karen Horn interviewed this year’s winner of the Herrmann Heinrich Gossen Award, Christoph Trebesch. And she spoke to Philipp Strack, the first German to receive the John Bates Clark Medal in 2024. There are also interesting contributions from economic policy researchers.

Achim Wambach
Managing Editor

With the move to open access, from 2025 the German Economic Review will offer free access to published research to all researchers worldwide. However, it is not only readers and authors who will benefit directly from the increased visibility of academic work. The editors also hope that this will have a positive impact on the number of submissions of high-quality research papers and thus further increase the importance of the German Economic Review in the future. I very much hope that the members of the Verein für Socialpolitik, but also interested authors outside the Verein, will continue to support our efforts to ensure the success of the German Economic Review through contributions and citations.    

Hartmut Egger
Managing Editor

The two journals Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik and German Economic Review will be published as open access journals from 1 January 2025. By switching to Open Access, the journals of the Verein für Socialpolitik are taking an important step towards greater visibility. „We are delighted to be able to realise this progress together with the ZBW and to extend the reach of the two publication organs of the Verein für Socialpolitik through Open Access“, comments the current VfS Chairwoman, Regina T. Riphahn.

Authors will continue to be able to publish their articles without paying a publication fee. Readers will be able to freely access and re-use the articles in both journals. This will reduce barriers to access and improve the visibility and dissemination of research published in the journals.

On 1 January, Klaus Schmidt becomes the new President of the Association. He also welcomes the Open Access publication of the association’s journals: „With its two journals, the Verein für Socialpolitik actively supports the movement for Open Access and Open Science. In future, anyone will be able to access the articles in Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik and the German Economic Review without a subscription, library access or paywall! This makes the journals much more attractive not only for readers but also for authors. We look forward to many good articles and greater visibility for economic research.“

The journals will continue to be published by DeGruyter as a service provider. DeGruyter will co-finance the production costs of the journals through the Subscribe-to-Open model.

Lukas Hack (Universität Mannheim)

for his paper „Progressive Income Taxation and Inflation: The Macroeconomic Effects of Bracket Creep“. The prize was awarded on the VfS Annual Conference 2024 in Berlin.

Three short questions for Lukas Hack:

Looking back: What do you wish you had known earlier as an economics student?
As a student, I wish I had known earlier how diverse and meticulous the work of many economists is. In introductory courses, one often gets the impression that economists make numerous unrealistic assumptions and only hold market-liberal views. However, this is a misconception. In reality, there is a great deal of diversity in research. Ideology, in my perception, plays little role. Instead, significant importance is placed on the empirical testing of theories.

Looking at the present:  What are you most concerned with in your research right now?
I am working on a new approach to estimate the causal effects of systematic monetary policy. Specifically, we are investigating how systematic monetary policy influences the impact of macroeconomic surprises, such as the effects of additional defense spending following a war. Our results show that the GDP growth impacts are highly dependent on monetary policy. If monetary policy is willing to tolerate higher inflation (expectations), then it significantly amplifies the growth effects of additional government spending.

Looking ahead: Why do we urgently need a new research data law and what would you like to see from the new government in this regard?
We need a new research data act to bring Germany’s data infrastructure up to international standards. Improving the data infrastructure not only strengthens research in Germany but also enhances economic policy advisory capabilities. The act should be based on the draft proposed by the previous government. Beyond a research data act, it would be desirable to promote more data infrastructure projects that analyze households and businesses in real-time. For example, in Mannheim, we survey companies every working day with the German Business Panel, keeping us in real-time at the pulse of the economy. Expanding such projects would enable real-time policy advice and make policy more responsive.

Simon Jäger (MIT)

Simon Jäger is an outstanding labour economist who has made a name for himself not only through his excellent research on competition in the labour market, the role of co-determination and worker representation, the determinants of wage formation and unemployment, but also through his remarkable ability to explain complex economic relationships to politicians and the public in simple and clear language.

Three short questions for Simon Jäger:

Looking back: What do you wish you had known earlier as an economics student?
During my undergraduate studies, I had too little exposure to real economic problems and working with data. That would have fascinated me even more back then. But I think the curricula and lectures have changed a lot since then. And I would have liked to have seen a stronger focus on trade and international economics. The field deals with core issues, but unfortunately it is still not represented strongly enough in curricula, especially empirical work in trade. This is particularly tragic for a country like Germany whose business model depends on trade.

Looking at the present:  What are you most concerned with in your research right now?
I am very interested in how inclusive institutions work, especially in the labor market. By this I mean institutions that enable and promote growth on the one hand, but also allow as many people as possible to participate in the growth dividends through their own work.

Looking ahead: Why do we urgently need a new research data law and what would you like to see from the new government in this regard?
It would be an enormous gain for evidence-based policy advice, and thus for effective policy in almost all areas, if the Research Data Act were to be passed soon. This would be an important step forward, especially at a time when only a small proportion of the population still sees the state as competent to solve problems. The current draft would be a huge step forward compared to the status quo, and I hope that the legislative process can be completed by the start of the new legislative period at the latest.

Christoph Trebesch (ifw Kiel)

Christoph Trebesch is one of the most internationally cited young economists. He specialises in international financial markets, macroeconomics, economic history and political economy. He has already produced numerous outstanding publications of exceptional breadth in these fields. With his academic excellence, Christoph Trebesch is a figurehead of cutting-edge research in the German-speaking world. He thus makes a valuable contribution to science and society.

Three short questions for Christoph Trebesch:

Looking back: What do you wish you had known earlier as an economics student?
How much time and freedom you actually have during your studies and your PhD. It is only much later that you realise how valuable this time is for the discovery of the world and of science.

Looking at the present:  What are you most concerned with in your research right now?
The link between geopolitics and economics. I want to understand the impact of growing great power conflict on globalisation and growth. I also want to understand how Germany should position itself in this new era. What geo-economic strategies make sense? How much should we spend on security? We have few answers to these central questions today.

Looking ahead: Why do we urgently need a new research data law and what would you like to see from the new government in this regard?
We should look at other countries. All the data available in the US and Scandinavia should also be made available here, especially detailed information on tax revenues, government spending and transfers. The lack of transparency in Germany is an obstacle to good, targeted economic policy.

Benjamin Moll (LSE)

Benjamin Moll is one of Europe’s most respected macroeconomists. His pioneering research on the macroeconomic and distributional consequences of monetary and fiscal policy is characterised by a remarkable combination of theoretical depth and practical relevance. Benjamin Moll has been able to penetrate complex economic issues and develop innovative approaches that both enrich academic debate and provide valuable impetus for monetary policy.

Three short questions for Benjamon Moll:

Looking back: What do you wish you had known earlier as an economics student?
That not everything in the textbook is ‚true‘ in the strict sense of the word; that instead there are often a number of different economic theories that can make contradictory predictions on certain issues, some of which are falsifiable (i.e. could be disproved with sufficiently good data), but that there are also other theories that are not ‚true‘ (i.e. cannot be disproved with sufficiently good data). But in some areas, such as macroeconomics, this is quite difficult; that textbook authors therefore have considerable editorial leeway in what they emphasise and what they omit, and that textbooks may therefore reflect their political biases; that if an economic theory doesn’t make sense to you, even after repeated attempts to understand it, it may well be because it doesn’t actually make sense!

Looking at the present:  What are you most concerned with in your research right now?
I am researching how the enormous heterogeneity observed at the micro level, especially the large differences in income and wealth, affects macroeconomics and macroeconomic policy. My work analyses the macroeconomic and distributional consequences of monetary and fiscal policies, as well as of disturbances such as the Covid-19 pandemic or the European energy crisis. One question I am currently thinking a lot about is how people form expectations in complex economies with heterogeneity. In particular, in a recent paper I argued that the assumption of rational expectations is problematic in models with heterogeneous agents because it implies that households and firms predict equilibrium prices by forecasting entire distributions. Not only is this obviously unrealistic, but it also makes the computation of these models much more difficult. We should therefore explore other approaches.

Looking ahead: Why do we urgently need a new research data law and what would you like to see from the new government in this regard?
Germany lags behind when it comes to the availability of data for research, particularly in comparison to Scandinavian countries, but also in comparison to countries such as the USA or the UK. A good start would be to make all administrative data collected by the state accessible for research and to create the necessary infrastructure.

The next Annual Conference will take place from 14-17 September, 2025 at the University of Cologne. The theme of the core conference is ‘Revival of Industrial Policy’.

Industrial policy is back in fashion after having been frowned upon for a long time. In their reports to the EU Parliament and the EU Commission, former Italian Prime Ministers Enrico Letta and Mario Draghi recommend a massive strengthening of industrial policy in Europe. The cornerstone of the new EU Commission’s economic policy is the “Clean Industrial Deal”, which aims to combine the transformation of the economy with the “competitiveness” of industry. In Germany, the country with the highest industrial share of GDP in Europe, the extent and direction of industrial policy is also being debated.

The triggers for this revival are manifold. In addition to the weak productivity development in Europe, these include the transformation to climate neutrality as well as the new geopolitical tensions and the associated need for a more resilient economy in Europe.

In science, “industrial policy” is not a research field in its own right, but is dealt with from different areas. The keynote speeches at the annual conference will address aspects of current developments in research on industrial policy and outline where further research is needed.

Reka Juhasz (University of British Columbia) is co-founder of “The Industrial Policy Group”, which deals with empirical questions of industrial policy with the aim of deriving “basic insights into global industrial policy practice”. Pol Antras (Harvard University), a leading foreign trade expert, will address trade and security of supply in his talk. Another contribution will deal with the interplay between industrial and competition policy.

The core conference panel will focus on European industrial policy and its geopolitical environment. The USA with its Inflation Reduction Act and China use subsidies to promote the domestic economy. At the same time, international agreements set limits for industrial policy. The World Trade Organisation allows tariffs to offset foreign subsidies. The EU’s state aid control largely prohibits state subsidies from EU countries, and the EU has just adopted a new regulation to be able to take action against foreign subsidies into the internal market. How should the EU position its industrial policy in this situation? What is planned and what works? The panel is made up of people from politics and science.

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• Job Market

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• Conference Calendar

Here you will find an overview of the association’s press releases and press reports.

• Press

At the end of the year, the term of office of the previous Managing Board will expire. We would like to thank Regina T. Riphahn (VfS Chairwoman), Kerstin Pull (Deputy Chairwoman) and Rudolf Winter-Ebmer (Secretary) for their outstanding commitment over the past two years.

Klaus Schmidt and Friedrich Breyer from the Managing Board will remain with us for a further term of office - Klaus Schmidt as Chairman and Friedrich Breyer as Association Treasurer. We are looking forward to working with them and all related projects!

We  thank all members who have been loyal over the years and those who have recently joined. Please do not hesitate to contact the VfS office if you have any questions or suggestions. We look forward to your visit to Cologne.