Expert Categories: Author
Laura Kalniņa
Laura Kalnina is organizational effectiveness consultant. She holds MSc in Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering from University of Greenwich and Executive MBA from Stockholm School of Economics Riga. Laura specializes in process management, operational excellence and AI adoption.
Signe Nīgale
Signe Nīgale is a strategic communications, international relations and change management expert. Her work spans the Nordea–DNB merger and the launch of the Luminor Group brand, along with roles at Nordea Baltic Banking, Lantmännen Group and Rail Baltica global project. Her current focus is on change management, AI transformation, strategic leadership communication. She holds an Executive MBA from the Stockholm School of Economics in Riga.
Pontus Larsson
Pontus holds a master’s degree in economics from the Stockholm School of Economics, where the research for this policy brief was conducted. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and economics from Uppsala University. He is currently an analyst of sustainable fuels at the Swedish Energy Agency (Energimyndigheten).
Vardan Baghdasaryan
Vardan Baghdasaryan is an associate professor of Economics at the American University of Armenia. He holds PhD in Public Economics from Catholic University of Milan (Italy). His research interests are in public economics, policy evaluation, gender economics, and labor economics. Along with his academic research, Dr. Baghdasaryan is engaged in policy advisory with international organizations, such as ILO, UNDP, and the World Bank.
David Zuchowski
David Zuchowski is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Economic Analysis at the University of Valencia. His research focuses on migration economics and applied microeconomics. He received his PhD in Economics from the University of Duisburg-Essen in 2024.
Daniel S. Hamermesh
Daniel S. Hamermesh is an emeritus professor of economics at the University of Texas at Austin and Royal Holloway, University of London. His research has concentrated on time use, labor demand, discrimination, academic labor markets, and unusual applications of labor economics (to beauty, sleep and suicide). In 2013 he received the biennial Mincer Award for Lifetime Contributions to Labor Economics of the Society of Labor Economists. In 2019 Oxford University Press published his Spending Time: The Most Valuable Resource.
Ksenia Rundin
Ksenia Rundin obtained a PhD in Business Administration from the Stockholm School of Economics in 2024 and currently holds a position as a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Statecraft and Strategic Communication at the Stockholm School of Economics. Her research examines contemporary propaganda and disinformation, with a particular focus on how strategies developed during the Cold War have evolved in the digital age through social media and emerging cyber threats.
Anhelina Vaskovska
Anhelina Vaskovska is an independent researcher specialising in international relations, with a regional focus on Eastern Europe. She holds an Erasmus Mundus Joint Master’s in Central and East European, Russian and Eurasian Studies and a Master’s degree in International Relations from Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Her research interests include political participation, youth empowerment, identity formation, and the societal impacts of armed conflict and geopolitical change.
Yuriy Gorodnichenko
Yuriy Gorodnichenko is a Professor of Economics at the University of California, Berkeley, a world-renowned institution for economic research and innovation. He also serves as a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and as Chairman of the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) International Academic Board.
As a leading applied macroeconomist, Professor Gorodnichenko focuses on monetary policy, fiscal policy, taxation, economic growth, pricing, and business cycles. His work combines theory and data to better understand how policies shape economies. He contributes actively to the academic community, serving on the editorial boards of top economic journals such as the Review of Economics & Statistics and VoxUkraine.
Since joining UC Berkeley in 2007, he has published over 40 peer-reviewed articles in leading journals. His research has influenced policy debates, academic discussions, and international media coverage around the world.
Professor Yuriy Gorodnichenko has received multiple awards for research excellence and policy impact, including the prestigious Michael Woodford Prize for Achievement in Monetary and Financial Economics, presented by the Bank of France and the Toulouse School of Economics.
Born in Ukraine, he earned his MA from the Kyiv School of Economics and PhD in Economics from the University of Michigan. His global academic journey reflects his dedication to advancing economic knowledge and evidence-based policymaking.
(Last updated September 2025)
Perihan Saygin
Perihan is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Applied Economics at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. She received her Ph.D. from the Department of Economics, IMT Lucca Institute for Advanced Studies, Italy, and she conducted her research for her PhD dissertation as a visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley. Before joining the UAB, she worked at the University of Mannheim, Germany, the World Bank, Washington, DC, and University of Florida, USA.