Publications

POID Working Paper

Organizational capacity and profit shifting

This paper analyses the effect of a firm's organizational capacity on the reported profitability of multinational enterprises (MNEs). Better organizational practices improve productivity and the potential taxable profits...Read more...

POID Working Paper

The impact of healthcare IT on clinical quality, productivity and workers

Adoption of health information and communication technologies ('HICT') has surged over the past two decades. We survey the medical and economic literature on HICT adoption and its impact on clinical outcomes, productivit...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Internet access and its implications for productivity, inequality and resilience

About one-fifth of paid workdays will be supplied from home in the post-pandemic economy, and more than one-fourth on an earnings-weighted basis. In view of this projection, we consider some implications of home internet...Read more...

POID Working Paper

The diffusion of disruptive technologies

We identify novel technologies using textual analysis of patents, job postings, and earnings calls. Our approach enables us to identify and document the diffusion of 29 disruptive technologies across firms and labor mark...Read more...

POID Working Paper

The demand for executive skills

We use a unique corpus of job descriptions for C-suite positions to document skills requirements in top managerial occupations across a large sample of firms. A novel algorithm maps the text of each executive search into...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Communication within firms: evidence from CEO turnovers

This paper uses novel, firm-level measures derived from communications metadata before and after a CEO transition in 102 firms to study if CEO turnover impacts employees' communication flows. We find that CEO turnover le...Read more...

Blog

POID blog:

Risk of Business Failure - POID Tracker

Research by Peter Lambert, Apolline Marion and John Van Reenen find that the number of firms at risk of failing has fallen from that earlier in the pandemic, but that one million jobs are still at risk and advancements c...Read more...

POID Working Paper

The donut effect of Covid-19 on cities

Using data from the US Postal Service and Zillow, we quantify the effect of Covid-19 on migration patterns and real estate markets within and across US cities. We find two key results. First, within large US cities, hous...Read more...

POID Working Paper

This time is not so different: income dynamics during the Covid-19 recession

We use a UK employer-employee administrative earnings dataset to investigate the response of earnings and hours to business cycles. Exploiting our long panel of data from 1975 to 2020 we find wide heterogeneity in the ex...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Why working from home will stick

COVID-19 drove a mass social experiment in working from home (WFH). We survey more than 30,000 Americans over multiple waves to investigate whether WFH will stick, and why. Our data say that 20 percent of full workdays w...Read more...

POID Working Paper

What triggers stock market jumps?

We examine next-day newspaper accounts of large daily jumps in 16 national stock markets to assess their proximate cause, clarity as to cause, and the geographic source of the market-moving news. Our sample of 6,200 mark...Read more...

POID Working Paper

The impact of Covid-19 on US firms

We use survey data on an opt-in panel of around 2,500 US small businesses to assess the impact of COVID-19. We find a significant negative sales impact that peaked in Quarter 2 of 2020, with an average loss of 29% in sal...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Innovation, growth and the transition to net-zero emissions

The climate crisis and the global economic impact of the Covid-19 crisis occur against a background of slowing growth and widening inequalities, which together imply an urgent need for a new environmentally sustainable a...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Education and management practices

The empirical management literature has found that the education of both managers and the workforce more generally appears to be an important driver of better management practices. This article sets out how such relation...Read more...

Blog

VoxEU:

OPENing up military innovation: The causal effects of 'bottom up' reforms to US defence research

In recent decades, US defence R&D seems to have lost its lustre. To combat the declining innovation, in 2018 the US Air Force reformed its contracting procedures to allow applicants more freedom to suggest projects with ...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Education and economic growth

This paper summarises the literature that has linked education and economic growth. It begins with an overview of the key concepts in neoclassical and endogenous growth models, and discussion on how these have been teste...Read more...

Blog

POID Blog:

Risk of Business Failure: POID Tracker

Peter Lambert and John Van Reenen track how UK businesses view their risks of bankruptcy over the next three months, finding extensions to COVID support schemes have helped avert a wave of bankruptcies, but risks remain....Read more...

POID Working Paper

Innovation and human capital policy

If innovation is to be subsidized, a natural place to start is to increase the quantity and quality of human capital. Innovation, after all, begins with people. Simply stimulating the "demand side" through R&D subsidies ...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Opening up military innovation: causal effects of 'bottom-up' reforms to U.S. defense research

Organizations investing in R&D must decide whether to solicit specific technologies or allow innovators to suggest ideas. Using administrative data, we study the 'Open' reform to U.S. Air Force R&D procurement, which inv...Read more...

POID Working Paper

Data-intensive innovation and the State: evidence from AI firms in China

Artificial intelligence (AI) innovation is data-intensive. States have historically collected large amounts of data, which is now being used by AI firms. Gathering comprehensive information on firms and government procur...Read more...

Blog

LSE British Politics and Policy:

Budget 2021: while important steps have been taken, bolder and better coordinated action is needed for a sustainable recovery

Anna Valero writes that the underlying and urgent issues that were facing the UK economy before the pandemic, such as high levels of inequality and weak productivity, are still present, and are indeed more pressing than ...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Innovation policy to restore American prosperity

The new US administration has the opportunity to reset an economic model that has failed to deliver prosperity for millions of Americans for decades. John Van Reenen calls for a Grand Innovation Challenge Fund – federal ...Read more...

POID Working Paper

World Management Survey at 18: lessons and the way forward

Understanding how differences in management "best practices" affect organizational outcomes has been a focus of both theoretical and empirical work in the fields of management, sociology, economics and public policy. The...Read more...

Blog

LSE Covid-19 Blog:

We can tackle the climate emergency and grow the economy at the same time

The idea that economic growth is incompatible with tackling the climate emergency is wrong, says John Van Reenen (LSE). He sets out how technological innovation and better management can bring about sustainable growth....Read more...

Blog

LSE Business Review:

Increasing support for clean innovation: a win-win-win strategy?

Political support for government spending to deal with the economic aftermath of the COVID pandemic has grown. It is now greater than during the 2008 financial crisis, and 'build back better' pledges have multiplied. Ral...Read more...