Fabian Slonimczyk, Assistant Professor, HSE: ‘This is Indeed an Important Event!’

The First International ‘Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey of HSE’ User Conference will be held in Moscow on May, 17-18th. Fabian Slonimczyk, Assistant Professor, International College of Economics and Finance, Faculty of Economics HSE gave a special interview to the HSE news service about the conference.

— This is the first international conference with such a range in Russia.  It's been in a long period of preparation. What are the goals and expectations for it?—

This is indeed an important event! For almost 20 years now, the RLMS has given the community of researchers’ invaluable information on the state of Russia's labor markets, as well as people's health, demographic issues (fertility, mortality), poverty levels, trends in cultural values and political ideas, and many other issues. This is the first conference that gathers researchers from all over the world who use this remarkable data source. The organizers have put together a very exciting programme with papers on a range of issues. What all papers have in common is that they are concerned with the well-being of Russia's people. It is really a good sample of some of the best work that is being done on Russia's economic and human development.

— Could you please introduce to us the conference's respectable international speakers?

— The conference programme includes too many top researchers to mention them all. Let me focus on the two keynote speakers: Klara Sabirianova Peter will present her work on the expansion of higher education and its effect on the returns to college quality. Dean Lillard will talk about the promise and potential of the RLMS-HSE data set. I am looking forward very much to these presentations!

— Why is international cooperation so important for researchers?

— The world of ideas does not have borders. The few restrictions that still remain to the free circulation of ideas will (hopefully) soon disappear. The Higher School of Economics has the opportunity to become one of the focus points for discussion of ideas in this part of the world. Events such as this one are important steps toward this goal.

Anna Chernyakhovskaya, specially for HSE news service