Invitation to the Inaugural Lecture of Prof Pedro Martins - Understanding how to create more and better jobs - Wednesday 21st October 18:30

The School of Business and Management, Queen Mary would like to invite you to attend the upcoming inaugural lecture for Prof Pedro Martins, one of our Professors of Applied Economics. 

This event is free to attend and you can find further details and reserve a place here

Understanding How to Create More and Better Jobs 

Professor Pedro Martins
Wednesday 21st October 2015
18:30 - 20:30
Skeel Lecture Theatre, the People's Palace 

Lecture Synopsis: 

The labour market plays a critical role in the economy, in society and in our individual lives. Understanding how the labour market operates and how its functioning can be improved is very important for policy makers, firms and all citizens. Fortunately, the last 20 years have witnessed a marked improvement in theory, evaluation methods and data. In this lecture Professor Martins will present some of his contributions to the discipline. He will also call on a greater interaction between researchers in economics and other fields of study as well as other stakeholders to promote further improvements in labour market evidence, policy and outcomes. 

Meet our Professor - Professor Pedro Martins:  

Pedro Martins is Professor of Applied Economics at Queen Mary University of London, receiving his Professorship in 2009. Pedro’s main research area is labour economics, having published several articles in leading journals and collaborated with a number of international organizations, statistics agencies, multinational firms and NGOs. Between 2011 and 2013, Pedro served in the Government of Portugal, as Secretary of State for Employment. During that period, he conducted a number of reforms, in areas such as employment law, active labour market policies, and collective bargaining.

Professor Pedro Martins Interviewed on BBC Radio 4 Today Programme

Professor Pedro Martins, Professor of Applied Economics and lecturer on the Masters in Public Administration at Queen Mary, was interviewed on BBC Radio 4's Today programme this morning.

Professor Martins‘ interview focused on the three-year economic and financial adjustment programme of Portugal, which is coming to its end next month. This programme involved a package of 78 billion euros, provided by the European Union, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund, and a number of measures in terms of fiscal consolidation, financial system stability and structural reforms. 

Professor Martins argued that Portugal is likely to opt for a ‘clean exit’ from the current programme, implying no further financial support and no further conditionality, given the increasing confidence of financial markets in terms of the outlook for the Portuguese economy. Professor Martins also explained that, in his perspective, this likely successful exit – following the footsteps of the Irish Case - implies that the combination of structural reforms and austerity measures can deliver good results in terms of putting an end to the Eurozone crisis.  

Listen to the interview here, the interview takes place at 02:48:33 (available for 7 days). 

An economist by training, Pedro Martins served as employment minister in the Government of Portugal from 2011 to 2013. He joined Queen Mary in 2004, becoming a Professor in 2009, and is the Module Leader for ‘Economics of the Public Sector’ on the MPA.