In its 2026 European Semester Spring Package, the European Commission for the first time signals a notable shift in framing competitiveness: while fiscal discipline remains important, greater emphasis is placed on the availability of a skilled and qualified workforce, which is constrained by technological and demographic transformation. How Europe can adapt will be a central theme of our annual conference this November.
Energy costs add another major challenge. Soaring energy prices, exacerbated by ongoing tensions in the Middle East, threaten an estimated 1.3 million jobs, particularly in energy-intensive industries. To ease the burden of high fuel prices on consumers and firms, Member States have implemented a range of emergency relief measures, including fuel tax cuts and other price interventions. While these measures provide short-term relief, our latest research suggests they may undermine the EU’s green transition and its quest for strategic energy autonomy.
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Save The Date – EconPol Annual Conference: Demographics, Technology, and the Future of Work in Europe
Representation of the Free State of Bavaria to the EU, Brussels | 9 November 2026
Rapid advances in robotics and AI are reshaping jobs and workplaces, while aging populations and a shrinking pool of young talent are tightening Europe’s labor markets.
Could the solution to Europe’s workforce challenges lie in the very forces that are transforming it? Our EconPol Annual Conference will bring together leading experts, policymakers, and business leaders to examine how demographic and technological change can be harnessed to create a more productive, resilient, and inclusive labor market. From unlocking the potential of women and older workers to embracing new technologies, we will explore how Europe can turn disruption into a competitive advantage.
Join us on 9 November 2026 in Brussels for this timely discussion on the future of Europe’s workforce. Registration will open shortly. For more details, program updates and speaker announcements, please visit our conference website.
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Robots and Non-Participation: Evidence and Lessons from the US and Europe
Sometimes, taking a step back and turning to history offers important cautionary insights. In this Policy Brief, Giuseppe Di Giacomo and Benjamin Lerch show that the rapid adoption of industrial robots between 1993 and 2014 in the US led to a sobering 18 percent decline in male labor force – with each additional industrial robot displacing four workers. The takeaway from the study is clear: Scale-up skills training, make work more flexible, and expand access to health and social services to ease transitions for the workforce.
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Energy Crisis Relief as Implicit Insurance: Fossil Import Dependence and Policy Design
On average, the EU covers 57 percent of its energy through imports of natural gas and oil. This leaves the continent vulnerable to external supply shocks – as seen during the 2022/23 energy crisis and the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. This Policy Brief argues that common relief measures, including fossil fuel tax cuts, act as implicit government insurance against fossil fuel price risks. By weakening incentives for households and businesses to switch to green energy, they effectively subsidize fossil fuels and lock in Europe’s import dependence. To counter this effect, the authors recommend higher fossil fuel taxes outside crisis periods, lower electricity taxes to encourage the use of clean domestic energy, and targeted transfers to low-income households.
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EconPol Forum 03/2026: “Dealing with Demographics – The Policy Challenges of an Aging Europe”
The next edition of our EconPol Forum, due out on 30 July, will take a deep dive into Europe’s aging challenge, including some of its less obvious dimensions. Beyond the well-known pressures on Europe’s shrinking labor markets, pension systems, and social services, we explore how aging societies change electoral behavior, including attitudes towards war and peace. We also examine the wider implications of raising retirement ages for care work and gender equality – from disparities in health outcomes to the impact of longer working lives on grandparental childcare and the disproportionate costs of elderly care for women.
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Policy Brief 85: Evidence Under Scrutiny – How Reliable Is the Research Backing Public Policy?
Policymakers rely on scientific evidence to inform complex decisions – or so one would hope. But what if the underlying research is flawed? This Policy Brief summarizes findings from one of the largest verification exercises in this field to date. Led by the Institute for Replication (I4R), the exercise reanalyzed 110 studies published in leading economics and political science journals. The good news: Full replicability has risen from 59 percent in 2014 to over 85 percent in 2026 – thanks to the introduction of mandatory data-sharing policies and data editors. The bad news: One in four statistically significant results does not hold under reasonable alternative specifications, and coding errors remain both common and often undetected.
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Policy Report 58: Carbon Pricing and Climate Investments
Despite a tenfold rise in EU carbon allowance prices since 2017, private green investment in Europe remains far too low to meet the climate targets set by the Paris Agreement. A new survey experiment with 830 German firms provides evidence that the notoriously high volatility of future carbon prices may be one important reason for firms to rationally delay profitable green investments: high price uncertainty suppresses investment just as strongly as higher prices encourage it. For the new EU emissions trading system (ETS2), to be operational by 2028, this implies policymakers must aim for both sufficiently high and predictable carbon prices if the mechanism is to function as an effective climate policy tool.
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