On February 20, ISET students delivered yet another policy seminar. The seminar was opened by Eric Livny, the president of ISET, who delivered an inspirational speech regarding the jobs of the future. He posed the question, “In this rapidly changing world, what do we need to teach schoolchildren today so that their skills and knowledge are still relevant ten or twenty years from now?”.

ISET is proud to announce that resident faculty member Norberto Pignatti has recently become a research fellow at the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), a private, independent research institute based in Bonn (Germany), which conducts nationally and internationally-oriented labor market research. IZA runs the world's largest research network in economic science, comprising over 1,300 international Research Fellows and Affiliates, as well as Policy Fellows from business, politics, society, and the media.

Vocational education and training (VET) reform has been at the top of the reform agenda in Georgia for several months. The government authorities perceive reforming VET as a solution to a range of interconnected challenges the country faces, such as labor market mismatches, the “over-education” trap, high unemployment, as well as poverty rates.

ISET is pleased to announce that a paper by Professor Noberto Pignatti entitled “Encouraging Women's Labour Force Participation in Transition Countries”, has been published as part of the IZA World of Labour series, an international platform that produces evidence-based advice for policymaking.

In 2014, 22% of Georgia’s working adults reported having worked more than 40 hours per week, i.e. working overtime. This may not sound like a lot, but, as an average figure, it hides a great deal of geographic variation in the incidence of overtime work. Very few people work overtime in places where there are almost no jobs, such as Kakheti or Racha. Conversely, more than 50% work over 8 hours/day in the dynamically developing Tbilisi, and as many as 44% in the adjacent Kvemo Kartli.