On Friday, February 20th, Jules Hugot from Sciences Po (Paris) gave a presentation of his job market paper "Trade Costs and the Two Globalizations: 1827-2012".
On February 16th, ISET hosted David Bostashvili PhD. from the University of Houston. Dr. Bostashvili presented his job market paper: “Political Budget cycles and Civil Service in American State Governments”. The motivation for this paper was an observation that all levels of government tend to spend budgets right before elections.
The lari depreciation has started to affect real estate market prices in Tbilisi. The average rental price for residential property has continued to fall, reaching a new historical minimum in February 2015.
On February 12th, ISET hosted Dr. Andrea Ciani from Bocconi University, who presented his job market paper "Export Quality Upgrading under Credit Constraints".
On February 11th, ISET hosted Olivier Harlem, Ph.D. of the Erasmus School of Economics, Rotterdam. Dr. Harlem presented his job market paper, “Earmarks”. Earmarks were U.S. federal funds that are designated for local projects and were easy for local representatives to obtain for their electoral districts.