Experts

Jens is part of Eurasia Groups Geoeconomics team, working at the intersection of politics, macroeconomics and markets. He has worked as a macro strategist at Wellington Management and as chief European economist at Royal Bank of Canada Capital Markets. He spent more than a decade at the Bank of England, working mostly on monetary policy issues, and served as alternate executive director for the UK at the IMF in Washington, DC. Jens has a PhD in economics from the University of Southampton, UK.

Melissa Lawford is an economics reporter at The Telegraph. Before that, she was property correspondent for three and a half years. Prior to joining the Telegraph, Melissa worked at British Airways’ High Life magazine and freelanced property stories for the Financial Times.

Christopher Lawson is a Faculty of Arts & Science Postdoctoral Fellow in the History Department at the University of Toronto.  He completed his PhD at the University of California, Berkeley in 2020.  He is a social and political historian of Modern Britain and the world, and his work focuses on the intersection of decolonisation, deindustrialisation, and the rise of ‘neo-liberalism’ in the mid-to-late 20th century.

Richard Layard is a labour economist who worked for most of his life on how to reduce unemployment and inequality. He is also one of the first economists to work on happiness, and his main current interest is how better mental health could improve our social and economic life.

David is a behavioural data scientist interested in using big data to understand and support human decision-making. He currently leads a team of behavioural scientists at Lloyds Banking Group, having held similar roles at Barclays Wealth, PwC, and hedge funds including First New York Securities and Tradelink LLC. David’s PhD is in Psychology from the University of Warwick.

Lee’s work focuses on innovation, labour markets, and economic development. He has also been Visiting Professor at Science Po Toulouse and before joining academia was Head of Socio-Economic Research at The Work Foundation, a think-tank. He has acted as consultant for projects for organisations ranging from the OECD, the British government, the World Bank, and the Kuwaiti government. He is Chair of the Policy Committee for the Regional Studies Association (RSA).