Public Outreach

It can provoke cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, contribute to climate change, impair the growth of crops, and damage buildings... Needless to say, air pollution causes a myriad of harmful effects. But how do you calculate the benefits associated with cleaner air when they do not come with a price tag? One way to do it is to estimate the amount we would be willing to pay to avoid associated deaths. And this is exactly what the economist Olivier Chanel did. Using research from Santé publique France, he expresses in euros the deaths that could be prevented by reducing air pollution.

With the Covid-19 crisis, the level of French national debt has shot up, but can we be sure that such high levels of debt will impede growth? This is a tricky question to answer, because there are many factors at work, such as variations in GDP (the primary consequence of excessive debt), or the quality of the information received by economic players. A study by economists Arnaud Chéron, Kazuo Nishimura, Carine Nourry, Thomas Seegmuller and Alain Venditti examines the complex issue of the relationship between debt and GDP.

Departments in France with the same socio-economic and historical conditions nevertheless present different fertility rates. Paolo Melindi-Ghidi and Thomas Seegmuller explain these surprising results by introducing a new hypothesis called “love for children”.

Want to encourage prosocial behavior? Paying people directly is less effective than giving them the choice between direct compensation and donation to a “good cause.” Economists Antoine Beretti, Charles Figuières, and Gilles Grolleau demonstrate this by proposing a way to motivate as many people as possible to behave virtuously.

What kinds of taxes on real estate exist in France? There are five main ones—not counting the country’s housing tax, which should disappear by 2023. Between annual taxes and lump-sum taxes, it is hard to keep track of exactly how much we pay over the course of our lives. To alleviate this problem, economists Guillaume Bérard and Alain Trannoy propose a radical tax reform to replace these various taxes with a single property tax.

Let’s say that a woman spends more time at work than her partner. Where’s the problem in that? In any case, it’s a rare occurrence—and for good reason. According to a study by Sarah Flèche, Anthony Lepinteur, and Nattavudh Powdthavee, the unequal distribution of domestic tasks often takes a toll on a woman's professional life. This study demonstrates how this mental load (which the majority of women still bear today) prevents them from being able to equally juggle their professional and family life and also harms their well-being.

The aim of universal health coverage is the provision of healthcare for all. Universal health coverage – in its essence, a deeply humanitarian initiative - is difficult to implement, because of its high cost to the public finance. At present in Palestine, more than half of the population is already covered, but what would it cost to extend coverage to every one of the country's inhabitants? How should such a policy be financed? Economists Mohammad Abu-Zaineh, Sameera Awawda and Bruno Ventelou have conducted a study of the issue.

When real estate prices rise, it influences business investment. For large-scale property owners, this is something to celebrate, and investment increases. For those whose activities are smaller in scale, the outlook dims as investments decline. In their studies, Denis Fougère, Rémy Lecat, and Simon Ray are focusing on financial frictions with relation to property investments.

In the United States, student debt is skyrocketing, and young people are saddled with surging interest rates on their loans. It is not uncommon for Americans to start their career already $100,000 in debt. However, an investment in human capital (education) is, in theory, a productive investment. Economists Xavier Raurich and Thomas Seegmuller demonstrate this by analyzing how the speculative bubbles individuals use to finance their studies or raise children are, in the end, good for growth.

Speculative bubbles are good for growth! This observation led to major debates among economists in the 2000s. Researchers Xavier Raurich and Thomas Seegmuller sought to explain this phenomenon by studying how economic agents make investment decisions during the periods of their life as young adults, middle-aged adults, and retirees. Young people can therefore invest in their education, which is a productive but illiquid capital, through credits from the bubble (liquid assets stemming from speculative capital).