Alex Bryson

Personnel economists of the world unite at COPE this March at the annual conference in Rotterdam. Check out the programme here: personneleconomics.eu/wp-content/u... @sriucl.bsky.social

Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society: Vol 65, No 2 Click on the title to browse this issue

Out now - IR Berkeley issue 2 in 2026. 4 of 7 papers are Open Access Check it out here: 9https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/1468232x/2026/65/2 @sriucl.bsky.social @ucberkeleyirle.bsky.social @wiley.com

Developing a new Linked Employer Employee Dataset for the UK - ESCoE This project will firmly establish the feasibility of developing a LEED data­set for the UK and outline practical steps for implementation.

Under this new @escoeorg.bsky.social project John Forth and I are working with ONS colleagues to construct the first comprehensive LEED spine for the UK www.escoe.ac.uk/projects/dev... @sriucl.bsky.social

Well-being Increases in Age Among Workers: Evidence From 103 Countries Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

Worker wellbeing rises in age in 103 countries. Find out more here www.nber.org/papers/w3478... @nber.org @dannyblanchy.bsky.social @sriucl.bsky.social

Why is it that union membership density is rising in Japan? Find out here in our new Hitotsubashi Institute of Economic Research Discussion Paper www.ier.hit-u.ac.jp/Common/publi... @sriucl.bsky.social @hitotsubashiu.bsky.social

Industrial Relations Call for Papers. Special Issue on the gender wage gap. Extended abstracts are due April 3, 2026.

Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society invites submissions to a special issue examining reasons for gender wage gaps around the world and policy responses to them.

Extended abstracts due April 3.

Learn more: irle.berkeley.edu/wp-content/u...

Our new paper examines the productivity dynamics of union locals in the USA. We show inter-union competition is not effective in raising productivity and effects of creative destruction are weak. Check it out: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.... @sriucl.bsky.social

Why is the Mental Health of the Youngest American Workers in Decline? Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

The young report lower job quality than other workers in the USA potentially contributing to their declining mental health. But other factors (employment selection and changing work orientations) may be at play www.nber.org/papers/w34696 @sriucl.bsky.social @dannyblanchy.bsky.social

The changing nature of work: What can we learn from time use diaries? - ESCoE This webinar will present new ONS time diary data to examine remote work and its relationship to time use, well-being, and self-perceived productivity.

Interested in the experiences of working from home versus at the workplace during and after COVID? Watch this @escoeorg.bsky.social webinar from @francescafolia1.bsky.social with discussion by me www.escoe.ac.uk/events/the-c... @sriucl.bsky.social

Working on the gender wage gap? We have a new call for papers for a Special Issue of IR Berkeley. Check it out here: irle.berkeley.edu/publications... @ucberkeleyirle.bsky.social @sriucl.bsky.social

Using UKHLS we show the changing age profile of mental ill-health is driven by rising mental ill-health among the young @sriucl.bsky.social

The disappearance of the hump shape in illbeing by age - Understanding Society Lifetime happiness trend changes as youth mental health suffers. It’s long been established that happiness makes a U-shape over our lifetimes

The U-shape of wellbeing – high when we’re young, then falling, and rising after middle age – was “among the most striking, persistent patterns in social science ... But this is no longer true” – new blog by @dannyblanchy.bsky.social @alexbryson.bsky.social @xiaoweixu.bsky.social @theifs.bsky.social

In our new paper on Eastern Europe and Central Asia we find no decline in the mental health of the young relative to older people which characterizes Western Europe and English-speaking countries onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
@sriucl.bsky.social @dannyblanchy.bsky.social

An Evaluation of Biases in Wellbeing Estimates Using Interviewers Versus Online Data Collection in the Global Flourishing Study Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

In our new @nberthe.bsky.social paper we illustrate the importance of accounting for survey mode in well-being research. Check it out here: www.nber.org/papers/w3459... @sriucl.bsky.social @dannyblanchy.bsky.social

Rising Young Worker Despair in the United States Between the early 1990s and 2015 the relationship between mental despair and age was hump-shaped in the United States: it rose in middle-age, then dec…

It's rising despair among young workers that's changing the age profile of poor mental health in the United States. Check out our new paper here: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... @sriucl.bsky.social @undp.org @dannyblanchy.bsky.social

Using genetic data to address economic and social issues with birth cohort data Join this one-day workshop on using genetic data to examine economic and social issues with birth cohort data.

Come join us @sriucl.bsky.social on December 12 for our workshop on the use of genetic data in birth cohorts to examine social and economic questions. Register here: www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/events/2...

Sneak preview of IR Berkeley's first edition for 2026. Five Open Access papers on strikes, wage mark ups and downs, educational mismatch and discrimination in hiring @ucberkeleyirle.bsky.social @sriucl.bsky.social

Opinion | For Gen Z-ers, Work Is Now More Depressing Than Unemployment

Jessica Grose’s nice piece citing our new research: For Gen Z-ers, Work Is Now More Depressing Than Unemployment www.nytimes.com/2025/11/05/o... @sriucl.bsky.social

Not Flourishing Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

Focusing on the 22 countries in the Global Flourishing Study we find not flourishing is highest among women and the young. We emphasise the importance of accounting for survey mode when examining wellbeing and illbeing. www.nber.org/papers/w3432... @sriucl.bsky.social @dannyblanchy.bsky.social

Labour market tightness and union activity Join this event to hear Patrick Nuess explore the effect of changes in aggregate labour market tightness on union membership, union elections, and strikes.

Patrick Neuss will be presenting at our QSS-CLS seminar on 22 October @sriucl.bsky.social Find out more here: www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/events/2...

Labour market prospects are key to understanding the North-South divide in young Europeans' life satisfaction. Find out more here: www.academia.edu/2997-9196/2/... @sriucl.bsky.social @uclsociology.bsky.social

Mari Tanaka (Hitotsubashi and UTokyo) and I provide the first evidence on trade union effects on firm-level wages and productivity for developing countries using World Bank Enterprise Data. Download our new discussion paper here: www.ier.hit-u.ac.jp/Common/publi... @sriucl.bsky.social @ucl.ac.uk

Thanks a lot for hosting @alexbryson.bsky.social!

Really looking forward to the exchange and to seeing some of my coauthors in person again. 😄

If anyone is in London and up for a coffee or a pint, let me know! ☕🍺

Close-up of a teen sitting on a ledge in jeans and a cardigan speaking to a therapist, who holds a clipboard and pen.

The middle-age misery "hump" has disappeared worldwide – why?

Research from @alexbryson.bsky.social with Dartmouth and @theifs.bsky.social suggests that increasing mental health challenges for young people are shifting the curve.
www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2025/aug/...

Job search under changing labour taxes Workers’ job mobility decisions are related to firms’ wage policies but also depend on tax schedules. Using Norwegian population-wide administrative l…

Higher wages reduce job separation rates but the effect weakens when taxes rise implying higher taxes reduce job search activity. Download our new paper free here: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... @sriucl.bsky.social @uclsociology.bsky.social

UCL – University College London UCL is consistently ranked as one of the top ten universities in the world (QS World University Rankings 2010-2022) and is No.2 in the UK for research power (Research Excellence Framework 2021).

Want a job in quantitative social science? We have two permanent lectureships in our Social Research Institute. Apply here: www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/... @sriucl.bsky.social

Lifetime trends in happiness change as misery peaks among the young – new research The rapid rise in despair before the age of 45, and especially before the mid-20s, has fundamentally changed the lifecycle profile of despair.

The rise in despair among the young means poor mental health is monotonously declining in age. This is the case in the USA, the UK and many countries around the world. Find out
More here: theconversation.com/lifetime-tre... @sriucl.bsky.social

The declining mental health of the young and the global disappearance of the unhappiness hump shape in age Across many studies subjective well-being has followed a U-shape in age, declining until people reach middle-age, only to rebound subsequently. Ill-being has followed a mirror-imaged hump-shape. Using...

The decline in mental health of the young in the last decade or so requires attention from governments around the world. Find out more here journals.plos.org/plosone/arti... @sriucl.bsky.social

Q&A with Francesca Arduini Francesca has just completed her Economics PhD. She tells us about her work on game theory and her future work joining the University of Oxford as an Economics Fellow.

Congratulations to Francesca Arduini for completing her economics PhD at @ucl.ac.uk. Lorraine Dearden and I had a great time supervising her. Find out more about her PhD and her new job at Somerville College here www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/people/m... @sriucl.bsky.social

The consequences of abuse, neglect and cyber-bullying on the wellbeing of the young We map changes in the mental health of young people in the United States. Then we run multivariate analyses to capture the independent correlation between young people’s mental health and difficulties...

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) have been rising for the young in the USA and are strongly and significantly associated with poor mental health in adulthood. Find out more here: doi.org/10.1371/jour... @sriucl.bsky.social @uclsociology.bsky.social @ucl.ac.uk @dannyblanchy.bsky.social