David Card gives the 2024 Economics Lecture, focusing on how evidence can contribute to public policy

David Card, a full professor of Economics at the University of California at Berkeley (USA), a Nobel Laureate in economics 2021 and an expert in labour economics and empirical microeconomics, gave the 2024 Economics Lecture, entitled “Evidence-based Public Policy”, which took place on the morning of 23 October and was presided by Laia de Nadal, rector of UPF.

The auditorium of the Ciutadella campus was packed to listen to one of the pioneers in the use of natural experiments in the field of economics: Card has created econometric models and has made very significant methodological contributions to address problems and seek solutions to issues of social relevance, such as the impact on employment of a rise in the minimum wage or what factors drive inequality and poverty.

The 33rd edition of the Economics Lecture served to inaugurate the 2024-2025 academic year of the UPF Faculty of Economics and Business. After the rector, Laia de Nadal had given her welcome and opening speech, Teresa Monllau, dean of the Faculty, and Joan Monràs, a full professor of Economics, who presented the speaker, also spoke.

In his lecture (pdf document), David Card wished to stress that evidence-based policy requires proof concerning underlying causal issues. He spoke about scientific evidence, randomized and counterfactual experiments, social experiments, natural experiments, and non-experimental research designs. “We can currently use natural experiments and other research designs to answer difficult causal questions related to how policies will affect various economic outcomes”, he assured.

“Despite the rise of evidence-based policies, it seems that in many countries, policy decisions today are driven by very different forces than those we have analysed to date”

Card has pioneered the use of so-called natural experiments: these are observational studies in which the allocation of subjects to experimental or control conditions is determined by natural factors beyond the scope of the researcher. Some of the natural experiments he gave as examples, designed by him, included, in the early 1990s, together with Alan B. Krueger, research he carried out concerning the increase in the minimum wage in New Jersey. He concluded that it had not resulted in job reduction of fast food companies in the state, contrary to the widely accepted belief among economists. Or several evidence-based case studies on the rapid assimilation of immigrant groups: Card found that they had a minimal economic impact on wages, and did not pose a threat to the labour market.

At the end of his speech, which was followed by a round of questions from the audience, David Card said that “despite the rise of evidence-based policies, it seems that in many countries, policy decisions today are driven by very different forces than those we have analysed to date”.

A renowned academic career, with research linked to social problems

David Edward Card (Guelph, Canada, 1956), a US-based Canadian economist, was one of three recipients of the 2021 Nobel Prize in economics, along with Joshua Angrist and Guido Imbens, “for their empirical contributions to the labour economics”.

Card received his PhD in Economics in 1983 from Princeton University in the United States. He was attached to the University of Chicago (1982-1983) and Princeton University (1983-1996), and in 2001 he joined the University of California at Berkeley (USA), where he is currently a full professor. From 2012 to 2017 he directed the Labor Studies Program at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Between 1988 and 1992, he was associate editor of Journal of Labor Economics and from 1993 to 1997, he was joint-editor of Econometrica. In 1995 he received the John Bates Clark Medal from the American Economic Association. Also, together with Richard Blundell (a speaker at last year’s Economics Lecture), he won the 2014 BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the category of Economics, Finance and Business Management for “his contributions to empirical microeconomics”.

Card’s research interests include wage determination, education, inequality, immigration, and gender issues. He has studied core aspects of the labour market, such as the impact of trade unions, unemployment benefits and social allowances. He has also made fundamental contributions in the field of immigration, and has calculated the consequences on employment of the local population of the arrival of foreigners, and in education, he has gauged the impact of educational level on wage differences.

A faculty with an international outlook rooted in Barcelona

At the beginning of the event, the rector of UPF, Laia de Nadal, welcomed “the 807 new undergraduate, master’s and doctoral students who are now joining one of the best economics faculties in Europe, an affirmation that is confirmed, among other indicators, by the main international rankings”. She gave as an example the latest edition of the recently published Times Higher Education ranking, which evaluates aspects such as teaching quality and international outlook, which places the Faculty in 29th place in Europe and 93rd in the world.

For her part, Teresa Monllau, dean of the Faculty of Economics and Business, assured that “the goal of the Faculty is to train professionals and researchers who face the challenges of our economic and social environment”. The dean highlighted the international profile of the technical, management and administration and service staff and the teaching and research staff of the centre, which she defined as “open to the world and welcoming to visitors, based on a love for Catalan culture and language”. Finally, the new 2024-2025 academic year of the Faculty was declared open.

> Album of the 2024 Economics Lecture published on Flickr