Our projects

In the 20 years since we founded Economix, we have worked on more than 200 research projects. This opened up perspectives to a wide range of research topics, methods and political strategies. We would like to thank all of our clients for the opportunity to deal with such a broad scope of interesting questions.

We were active in three major areas:

  • Labour market, education and social policies
  • Long-term forecasts of the labour markets
  • Surveys and development of statistical indicators


Labour market, education and social policies


An important focus of our work was and is the analysis of labour market policy:

  • A pivotal role in our research activities has been given to the studies on the European employment strategy and its activating employment policies. We had the excellent opportunity to accompany the emergence of this strategy and its implementation with a series of reports for the European Commission. This field of research gained particular importance with the implementation of the German Hartz reforms in 2005 and was extended to Japan, Australia and European countries on behalf of the OECD. In 2018, we created a comparative analysis of the activation of minimum income earners for the European Commission.
  • Another focus was set on the organisation of the employment services. We are members of the expert network of the European employment services and the European Mutual Learning Programme of the European Commission. On behalf of the Inter-American Development Bank, we advised the employment services in Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru on the restructuring of the labour market policy, the optimization of management systems, and the establishment of profiling instruments. Similar consulting projects were carried out on behalf the World Bank in Africa, the Middle East, in Central Asia, and in Eastern Europe. We have recently prepared a report on the measures taken by European employment services in connection with Covid-19.
  • A series of research projects concentrated on the analysis and forecasting of migration flows. This involved both identifying global trends and assessing regional and sector-specific effects.
  • The integration of older workers in the labour market has accompanied us throughout the years as a research question. Most recently, political approaches were presented in extensive country analyses on behalf of the OECD. The Europe-wide analyses of long-term unemployment and employment subsidies were also prepared in this context.
  • We also dealt with the integration of young people, either at regional level, for example in the state of Saxony, or most recently as part of the Europe-wide analysis of employment guarantees for young people.

The integration of the labour force in the labour market is closely related to education policy, particularly vocational education and training policy. To this end, we have created fundamental work on the role of education systems for competitiveness and structural change. We advised the German government on the reform of the German vocational training system and evaluated the possibilities for the British government to introduce apprenticeship training in Great Britain. We also participated in the comparative study on the education systems in Europe for the European Commission. Skills shortages, training and further training of IT specialists as well as the international migration of IT specialists were the subject of an investigation in seven countries worldwide for the ILO.

Social policy has a similarly important role in our research spectrum as education policy. The question of who is marginalised by the prevailing economic and social regime and how these people are to be reintegrated was of great concern to us. The questions were addressed by the early investigation on precarious employment in Europe (ESOPE) and by the evaluation of the EU Community Initiative EQUAL. Furthermore, social innovations and the role of social capital were important issues. Most recently, we discussed the question of measures to combat poverty in Europe in a peer review paper for the European Commission.


Long-term forecasts of labour markets


In collaboration with the Warwick Institute for Employment Research (UK) and Cambridge Econometrics (UK), we have made long-term forecasts for the labour markets in European countries. On behalf of the European Agency for Vocational Education and Training CEDEFOP, we have been involved in the ongoing long-term forecasts for the EU and the single EU countries. For Germany, the forecast “Labour Market 2030” was drawn up for the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs in 2011-16. The focus was on identifying skills shortages, the effects of immigration, and the expected effects of digitization. The basis for this work was laid by preceeding European long-term forecasts, as well as by sector-specific development scenarios. The methods were described in separate reports (EU, D).

In connection with the long-term development trends, specific studies on migration flows, on the need for replacement in the demand for labour, as well as studies on individual sectors of industry, such as medical technology, textiles and clothing industry, and on the financial sector were created.

On behalf of the Bertelsmann Stiftung, forecasts of the demand for skilled workers in day care centres are now developed. To this end, both the training capacity and the expansion and replacement needs are forecasted over the next 10 years.


Surveys and development of statistical indicators


As early as the 1980s, Kurt Vogler-Ludwig and the Institute for Employment Research of the Federal Employment Agency began to develop indicators for job vacancies in the German labour market. First in parallel approaches, after 1992 in the joint project "Aggregate job vacancies", which still exists today. The number of vacant positions in companies is determined using surveys and specified estimation procedures. In addition, information on the process of filling job vacancies is obtained. The data represent an important aspect of the job market and are used continuously in official job market analysis. The survey has been part of European labour market statistics since 2006 and is currently carried out on a quarterly basis on behalf of Eurostat.

Economix also developed the indicator on duration of working life on behalf of Eurostat. This indicator calculates the average number of working years over the life time, based on data on life expectancy and labour force participation. It is part of the statistical data set for monitoring the EU 2020 strategy. In addition, the European Commission has assigned us to develop indicator systems for regional labour markets.

For the European Training Foundation (ETF), Economix has developed indicators for imbalances in the labour market that are used to analyse and implement evidence-based labour market policies for ETF partner countries in Southeast Europe. This project is currently being updated and offered to all ETF partner countries.

Last update: September 2020