Nezih Guner is ICREA Research Professor at MOVE (Markets, Organizations and Votes in Economics), an adjunct faculty at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, and a Research Professor of Barcelona Graduate School of Economics. He received his BA in Economics and Sociology from Bogazici University (Turkey) in 1992 and his PhD from University of Rochester in 2000. He is a Research Fellow with Institute for Study of Labor (IZA) and a Research Affiliate with Center for Economic Policy Research (CEPR). He is also a member of the Council of the European Economic Association. He is the Editor of the Journal of Spanish Economic Association (SERIEs), and an Associate Editor of Economics Letters and Journal of Demographic Economics. In 2010 he was awarded a Starting Grant by the European Research Council. Nezih Guner is currently on leave from ICREA at CEMFI (Madrid).

Research interests

Family structure in the U.S. and Europe has changed dramatically during the 20th century. Decline of marriage, rising female labor force participation and increasing number of single mothers are the three most important aspects of this change. There have also been big changes in sexual norms as premarital sex became much less of a taboo. An important part of my recent research has focused on causes of these changes, their consequences for children, income inequality, and social mobility, and how public policies (e.g. social insurance programs) might affect the family. I have also been studying how changes in the family structure alter the way traditional public policies (e.g. taxation, social insurance programs) affect the economy. On a different line of research, I study how misallocation of resources at the micro level can affect aggregate productivity, and the role of government policies on the misallocation of resources. I also focus on the effects of trade and globalization on labor markets and inequality.