Job Market 2015-2016 at PSE: who are Bertrand Achou, Marie Boltz and Léa Bousquet?
Throughout October and November, we will present you PSE Job Market candidates for 2015-2016.
Every week, PSE candidates introduce their path and research interests :
- week from 13th to 19th of October : Bertrand Achou, Marie Boltz and Léa Bousquet
- week from 20th to 26th of October : Olivia Bertelli, Yannick Dupraz and Ricardo Estrada
- week from 28th of October to 3rd of November : Sarah Fleche, Gabor Katay and Pauline Rossi
- week from 4th to 10th of November : Arthur Silve, Camille Terrier and Frederic Vinas
What is the Job Market ? Every year, some PhD and post-doc students of the Paris School of Economics decide to be candidate on the Job Market. Sort of an international labour exchange, the Job Market allows candidates to apply for universities and institutions in many countries. PSE candidates receive a specific support program, which enables them to prepare at best their applications, the recruitment interviews, the presentation workshops etc.
- To access the official web page in which all PSE candidates to 2015-2016 Job Market are presented (Research fields, Job Market papers, CV,...), click here.
Bertrand Achou
« I obtained a master’s degree in Empirical and Theoretical Economics from the Paris School of Economics and the Université Paris 1 in 2012. I then started a joint PhD funded by the European Comission (EDEEM) under the supervision of Hippolyte d’Albis (PSE/Paris 1) and Agar Brugiavini (Ca’ Foscari), which I completed this September. I also spent a year at the Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL) as a visiting PhD student. I am currently a teaching assistant (ATER) at Sciences Po.
In my Job Market paper, I try to assess the influence of informal insurance mechanisms within retired couples on dissaving behaviour, a channel that has so far not been considered within the life-cycle literature on retirement. As a matter of fact, my primary interest is about life-cycle behaviours in retirement and about the specific risks that retirees face. My secondary field is housing economics and I am particularly interested in the influence of housing on macroeconomic dynamics.
I participated to several workshops and conferences especially on ageing, for instance in the framework of Netspar and Cintia. I am currently working on a detailed literature review on the determinants of house prices as an external consultant for EMMA, a partnership between the Collège de France and Crédit Agricole. I also occasionally write for a French website (BSI-Economics) in which young economists, from both academia and the private sector, give their opinions on a varied set of topics. »
Marie Boltz
« I am a graduate student in Economics at ENS Cachan, the Erasmus University of Rotterdam, ENSAE Paris Tech and the Paris School of Economics (PSE).
I obtained Ph.D in Economics at PSE last month under the supervision of Sylvie Lambert. My research focuses on Household Economics in developing economies. Specifically, I aim to better understand how resources are allocated within the extended family in context where individuals heavily rely on informal arrangements within their social networks.
In my Job Market paper, along with two young researchers, I estimate the hidden cost of informal redistribution within the extended family and how it affects resource allocation. For this, I investigate strategies used by people to keep their income hidden from their peers. Based on an original lab-in-the-field experiment in Senegal, I find that some people are ready to forgo up to 14% of their income to avoid public exposure and thus, informal taxation. Getting the opportunity to hide their income allows them to decrease by 28% the share of income devoted to transfers to kin and to reallocate this extra money to personal and health expenses.
As an applied economist, I attach a lot of importance to the knowledge of the field and the quality of the data. Therefore, I acquired in Senegal, the country I study, a significant experience in all steps of data collection – from fundraising to survey design and implementation – and in different types of surveys – a qualitative survey, a panel of individuals of a nationally representative household survey and a lab-in-the-field experiment. During my PhD, I presented my work at numerous national and international conferences in Europe and in the US. In November I will attend the NEUDC conference at Brown University.
My hope for the Job Market is to find a position as an assistant professor in a good university offering high quality research interactions and opportunities within a friendly research team working on related topics, as well as challenging and interesting teaching possibilities. »
Léa Bousquet
« After completing my masters in Theory and Empirical Methods in Economics, I began my PhD under the supervision of Jérôme Pouyet and Nicolas Jacquemet at the Paris School of Economics. I am also currently a teaching assistant (ATER) at Sciences Po Paris.
My research interests are mainly in behavioral economics and in experimental economics. So far, I have focused on the behavioral biases related to time and risk preferences. For my Job Market paper, I run a lab experiment which aims to elicit how well the participants are able to anticipate their potential bias of time inconsistency. I found that when they are biased, the individuals tend to be naive, i.e. they underestimate their bias. However, a majority of them cannot be considered as biased and anticipate well their time preferences.
In addition to taking advantage of a stimulating environment at PSE, I had the chance to interact with other researchers during international conferences (SABE, IMEBESS) and the behavioral economics summer camp organized by the Russell Sage Foundation.
On the Job Market, I am looking for an academic position which allows me to both continue my on going projects as well as to start collaborations on new projects. »