ERC Consolidator Grant for Africa@Work: Reconstructing a Century of Labour and Livelihoods in Africa
In December 2025, the European Research Council (ERC) awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant to Jutta Bolt, Professor of Global Economic History at the University of Groningen and Board Member of the N.W. Posthumus Institute for her research proposal...
Do Countries Need “Absorptive Capacity” to Benefit from Foreign Investment?
Foreign direct investment (FDI) is often seen as a powerful engine of economic growth. Yet policymakers are frequently told that attracting FDI is not enough: countries must first build “absorptive capacity” through better education, deeper financial...
Penn World Table version 11.0 is published
New Research Sheds Light on How Skill Mismatches Shape Productivity Gaps
A new study, “How important is human capital misallocation across sectors for aggregate productivity differences? Evidence beyond Cobb-Douglas,” by Jan Trenczek (Prognos AG) and Konstantin M. Wacker (University of Groningen), reconsiders how much...
New GGDC Research Highlights Agriculture’s Surprising Role in Global Productivity Convergence
A new paper by Robert Inklaar and Ryan Marapin, "Accounting for productivity convergence: sectors and structural change," offers fresh insights into the forces behind global labour productivity convergence from 1990 to 2018.
Abe de Jong receives NWO grant for project on the effects of slavery in the Dutch Caribbean colonies
Professor Abe de Jong has received a grant of €838.000 from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) for a project titled “Collateral damage: The financial economics of slavery”.
Alan Heston (1934-2024)
Veni grant for Amaury de Vicq de Cumptich
Nobel Prize 2024 Awarded for Groundbreaking Work on Institutions and Prosperity
Call for papers: 8th World KLEMS Conference in Tokyo
The 8th World KLEMS Conference will be held on March 27-28, 2025 in Tokyo. This is the second World KLEMS Conference in Tokyo, with the first one held in 2014. This conference is organized by Gakushuin University, Hitotsubashi University, and Research...