Alex Bryson

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

Marginal decisions on employment retention can substantially impact racial earnings gaps. Find out more here: www.rfberlin.com/wp-content/u... @sriucl.bsky.social @uclsociology.bsky.social @ucl.ac.uk

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.

Working on the use of genetic data in social sciences with birth cohort data? Then submit a paper to our workshop here: www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/events/2... @sriucl.bsky.social @clscohorts.bsky.social

The wellbeing of the young has been declining in many Latin American countries, across surveys, and using various measures of wellbeing and mental health. Check out our #OpenAccess paper out today: link.springer.com/content/pdf/... @sriucl.bsky.social @dannyblanchy.bsky.social @undp.org

Call for abstracts: genetics, economic & social issues.

We're hosting a 1-day workshop on using genetic data to examine economic & social issues on 12th December at UCL’s Social Research Institute. More info & submission at link below #genetics #socialscience #economics #cohort

bit.ly/41EnPmu

Rising Young Worker Despair in the United States 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...

Today is International Youth Day. So it's an important moment to think about rising despair among the young in the United States. Check out the latest evidence here: www.nber.org/papers/w34071 @sriucl.bsky.social @nber.org

David Blanchflower & @alexbryson.bsky.social explore new research from across Asia and the Middle East which shows that web-based surveys suggest young people are less happy, while face-to-face or telephone surveys suggest the opposite.
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky #InternationalYouthDay

Here's a preview of our final IR Berkeley of the year out soon. Eight papers covering issues from the impact of occupational licensing on retirement through to workforce composition and its effect on trust at the workplace.

Here's a preview of our last edition of the year. Eight papers ranging from the impact of occupational licensing on retirement through to trust in the workplace. Check it out. @ucberkeleyirle.bsky.social @sriucl.bsky.social

Rising Young Worker Despair in the United States 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...

Despair in the United States now declines with age. This is due to the rise in despair among young workers. Find out more here: nber.org/papers/w34071 @sriucl.bsky.social @nber.org @dannyblanchy.bsky.social

Survey mode matters a lot when assessing the mental health of the young. Our paper is free to download via #OpenAccess here: link.springer.com/content/pdf/... @sriucl.bsky.social

Graph showing life satisfaction aged under-25 in Greece, Spain, France, Italy, and Portugal. The traditional U-shape in wellbeing, with people’s life satisfaction lowest in their late 40s or early 50s, appeared to have been replaced around 2013-15 by wellbeing rising with age, driven by a collapse in the wellbeing of the young. This column uses survey data from 21 European countries to show while that the U-shape has indeed disappeared, by 2020–2024 it was replaced by life satisfaction rising with age in Northern European countries but falling with age in Southern Europe where the young have been getting more satisfied with life, possibly due to improvements in the youth labour market.

Survey data from 21 European countries shows that life satisfaction is rising with age in Northern Europe, but falling with age in Southern Europe where the young have been getting more satisfied with life.
David Blanchflower & @alexbryson.bsky.social
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

What’s behind the North-South divide in young Europeans’ life satisfaction? Find out here: cepr.org/voxeu/column... @sriucl.bsky.social @voxeu.org @uclsociology.bsky.social

Job-to-job transitions have fallen as the bite of the UK's minimum wage has risen. Download our new paper free through #OpenAccess here: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.... @sriucl.bsky.social @wagedynamics.bsky.social

What's happening to unionization in Japan? Find out here www.rfberlin.com/wp-content/u... or here www.ier.hit-u.ac.jp/Common/publi... You might be surprised @sriucl.bsky.social @uclsociology.bsky.social @ucl.ac.uk

Alex Bryson ROCKWOOL Foundation

Today I became a Research Fellow at the Rockwool Foundation (RF Berlin). I'm looking forward to making a contribution www.rfberlin.com/author/abrys... @sriucl.bsky.social @uclsociology.bsky.social @ucl.ac.uk @ucleconomics.bsky.social

Great to read that the ONS Economic Microdata Transformation team have begun development work on the prototype recommended in ESCoE's recent LEED report: tinyurl.com/t5hx4372

@christinavpalmou.bsky.social @alexbryson.bsky.social

Life Satisfaction in Western Europe and the Gradual Vanishing of the U-shape in Age 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...

Why is life satisfaction of the young rising in Southern Europe? Find out here: www.nber.org/papers/w3395... @sriucl.bsky.social @dannyblanchy.bsky.social @nber.org

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…

Increased marginal tax rates reduce job-to-job transitions, consistent with a reduction in job search activity. Download our new paper for free here www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... @sriucl.bsky.social

Accounting for Firms in Ethnic Wage Gaps Across the Earnings Distribution - NIESR Most studies of ethnic wage gaps rely on household survey data. As such, they are unable to examine the degree to which wage gaps arise within or between firms.

Our NIESR paper using ASHE-Census linked data presents new evidence on the role of the firm in ethnic wage gaps in England and Wales across the wage distribution niesr.ac.uk/publications... @sriucl.bsky.social @wagedynamics.bsky.social @niesrorg.bsky.social