Richard Davies is an economist and author. He teaches courses on economics and data science, both with a focus on policy, in the School of Public Policy. Richard is also the Director of the Growth Co-Lab at ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳, a research collaboration with Harvard University’s that provides advice to governments on inclusive growth practices, with recent projects covering Ukraine, the UK, Namibia, Tanzania and South Africa.
Prior to joining the ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳, he taught at the University of Chicago and ran their new initiative—a project providing open-access materials in order to broaden public engagement and understanding of economics. He is the founding director of the UK's , holds a chair as the Professor of the Public Understanding of Economics at Bristol University and is a visiting Professor at the . Before academia he worked in policy and journalism: he has been Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers at HM Treasury, an economist and speechwriter at the Bank of England, and economics editor of The Economist.
Richard's book (2020) won the Lonely Planet/Stanford's prize for debut travel writing, and has been published in the UK , US, Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan. He wrote and edited The Economist’s (2015), and his articles have featured in The New York Times, The Financial Times, The Guardian and The Sunday Times. He is committed to raising public engagement with economics and is director, with Professor Diane Coyle, of the annual .
Also an active researcher, Richard is interested in using micro data to answer questions about aggregate puzzles, including those relating to inflation, productivity, and trade. His most recent paper, a collaboration with colleagues at the , tracks the decline in British dynamism and proposes policies to reinvigorate it. Previous work with ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳ colleagues has identified the in the UK. He studied economics at Oxford (PPE), the London School of Economics (MSc) and holds a PhD from New York University's Stern School of Business.
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