Press Conference: Nobel Prize for Economics awarded to Christopher Pissarides

Summary

Episode Summary: Nobel Prize Press Conference for Christopher Pissarides

London School of Economics: Public Lectures and Events • October 11, 2010

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Main Theme

This episode is a press conference celebrating Professor Christopher A. Pissarides’ Nobel Prize in Economics, hosted at the LSE. The session features Pissarides answering questions from journalists, colleagues, and phone-in listeners about his research, its impact on unemployment policy, and its practical applications in different countries.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Path to the Nobel & Foundational Work

• Pissarides' Initial Reaction (00:28):
  • Expresses surprise and humility about receiving the Nobel Prize.
  • "It still hasn't sunk in completely actually... It's mainly an honor, both for LSE as well. I mean, I've been a product of the LSE since graduate school."
• Nature of the Discovery (02:00):
  • Describes the challenge in economics relative to fields like medicine.
  • Emphasizes that the Nobel recognized the development of a theoretical framework for understanding unemployment, not a “cure.”
  • "It’s really more about developing a framework. Now, of course, you could do a framework and no one could use it and then it gets forgotten. But we're lucky enough that people use this one."

2. Explaining the Framework and Real-World Impact

• Roots and Motivation (02:20–03:58):
  • His work began amid rising unemployment in Europe in the late 1970s and 1980s.
  • Prior economics literature lacked a method to analyze persistent high unemployment.
  • The framework developed gives policymakers tools to analyze the impact of different policies on unemployment.
• Recent Recessions as Examples (03:55–04:50):
  • Contrasts how countries’ unemployment rates have varied during recessions, due in part to different applications of his framework.

3. Policy Applications and Recommendations

• Examples in Practice (05:01):

  • “The New Deal for the unemployed” in the UK is cited as a positive example of policy guided by the framework.
  • Recommends policies that prevent prolonged unemployment so individuals’ skills and work mindsets remain intact.
  • Scandinavian countries highlighted as having particularly effective, refined policies.

• Addressing Youth Unemployment (06:18):

  • Endorses expanding higher education as both an unemployment policy and a means to raise workforce productivity.
  • Notes Sweden’s positive experience with such measures.

4. Fiscal Policy and Unemployment

• Budget Cuts vs. Targeted Intervention (07:21):

  • Pissarides does not favor across-the-board public spending cuts; recommends smaller, smarter budgets with targeted unemployment policies.
  • “You could get quite far in dealing with unemployment with very inexpensive policies... Not much more than what you would spend on unemployment insurance benefits, for example.”

• Structural Unemployment (08:20):

  • Argues there’s no intrinsic reason for higher structural unemployment post-crisis, provided periods of unemployment are kept short.

5. The Importance of Duration and Deregulation

• Preventing Long-Term Unemployment (09:00):

  • Stresses that keeping the duration of unemployment short is critical to prevent rises in structural unemployment.

• Labor Market Deregulation (13:04):

  • Supports moderate deregulation, balancing needed worker protections with labor market flexibility.
  • Critiques excessive regulation leading to inflexible or two-tier labor markets (e.g., as seen in Spain).

6. International Perspectives & Case Studies

• US Unemployment Puzzle (15:05):

  • Puzzled by the high US unemployment in the recent recession compared to previous patterns; suggests overcautious hiring due to uncertainty about external finance.

• Emerging Markets (24:07):

  • Advises growing economies to avoid introducing restrictive labor market benefits during growth periods, as these can become problematic when growth slows.

• Latin America and Subsidies (25:56):

  • Suggests targeting subsidies to give unemployed direct work experience, rather than only training programs.

7. Applying the Theory in Greece (29:17):**

• Recommends reforms to increase labor force participation, raise retirement ages, and ease job protection laws to help Greek labor markets.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Framework’s Relevance:

  “The way we have really is that it gives you the framework to study the impact of policy on unemployment, and then it’s up to the policymakers…”
  — Christopher Pissarides (03:35)

• On Specific Policy:

  "You shouldn't allow the unemployed to remain unemployed for very long periods of time because they lose their skills, they lose the sort of mentality that is required to get another productive job."
  — Christopher Pissarides (05:22)

• On Budget Cuts:

  “I wouldn't be in favor of unconditional cuts in public spending in the labor market because that could have bad effects on unemployment.”
  — Christopher Pissarides (07:24)

• On Rising Unemployment in the US:

  “It’s a puzzle why unemployment has gone up by as much as it has in the United States... American companies rely a lot more on external finance than companies in Europe.”
  — Christopher Pissarides (15:10)

• On being recognized as Cypriot:

  “It was one of the things that made me happiest actually is that reaction there, the way they sort of embrace me as a Cypriot.”
  — Christopher Pissarides (31:16)

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Important Timestamps

| Time | Segment | |------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 00:28–02:00| Pissarides reflects on winning and explains the nature of the Nobel prize in economics | | 03:00–05:50| Discussion of developing policy frameworks, examples from recent recessions | | 06:18–06:52| Policies for youth and expanding higher education | | 07:21–08:20| On budget cuts, targeting unemployment, and avoiding structural unemployment | | 13:04–14:52| Labor market deregulation and its effect | | 15:05–17:04| Unemployment and productivity—US and international puzzles | | 24:07–25:41| Advice for emerging economies | | 25:56–28:08| Addressing Latin American unemployment and the value of targeted subsidies | | 29:17–31:16| Applying theory to Greece; emotional ties to Cyprus |

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Tone and Atmosphere

The event is celebratory yet down-to-earth, with a mixture of academic rigor and personal anecdotes. Pissarides is humble, reflective, and clear, frequently emphasizing both the practical and theoretical importance of his work.

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Conclusion

This episode offers a unique opportunity to hear Nobel laureate Christopher Pissarides discuss his influential work on unemployment, the evolution of economic policymaking, and the importance of combining theoretical frameworks with well-targeted, flexible policy. The conversation is rich in real-world applications, ranging from Europe to the Americas, and underscores the global impact of foundational economic research.

Transcript

[Moderator]

He'll be very happy to take questions from the room, of course, but we also have, I believe, and I hope, some people listening in by phone. So at some point we will go to them to enable questions from the phones as well. But for now, I'm going to hand over to the new Nobel Prize winner and let you ask him questions if you'd like to. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Anyone got any questions? If not, I'll ask you, sir.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Pictures. Yeah, well, it still hasn't sunk in completely actually. So I don't know, it took me by surprise this morning and little by little it's beginning to realize that it's reality and not hallucination from the cold that I've been suffering for the last three days. It's obviously a very honor. Not really. I mean, you can never expect these things or you shouldn't, you should never expect them rather. But it's, I mean, it's mainly an honor, both for LSE as well. I mean, I've been a product of the LSE since graduate school and that's it. Professor, I have a question. Normally when we're informing about the Nobel Prize, we're trying to explain everyone what exactly happened? What is the discovery and as far as it is very hard for us to understand. Could you use your own words to explain our viewers and listeners, what actually did you discover as simple as possible? Well, of course, Nobel Prizes in economics are not like medicine, where I can tell you I discovered the cure for such and such a disease, although it's a little bit like that. But maybe. Well, maybe the best way to explain to you is by going back to the time when I started doing my research after I got the appointment here. And the big problem at the time was unemployment in Europe, because unemployment in Europe up to the late 70s, when I started here was very low and then suddenly jumped up. And the question is, why is it going up and is there anything we can do about it? And when you looked at the economics literature at the time, there was really no answer to that question. There was no framework to think about this issue. So the way that I started, and also my co winners independently started working with is to try and develop a framework for dealing with the problem of unemployment that will guide those policy makers and also initiate other research in economics. So it's really more about developing a framework. Now, of course you could do a framework and no one could use it and then it gets forgotten. But we're lucky enough that people use this one. Yeah, I mean, unemployment is rising again. In fact, the unemployment response in the previous Great Recession we had, which was in the 1980s, it was more or less uniform in all countries. Policy makers didn't know what to do to deal with unemployment, more or less in the 80s and early 90s, and unemployment went up everywhere. If you look now at the current recession, unemployment went up a lot in Spain and the United States. It actually decreased in Germany. And it was partly the framework that we developed, if I can say rather immodestly, that helped policymakers put forward certain ideas that had different impact on unemployment in the recession. So the way we have really is that it gives you the framework to study the impact of policy on unemployment, and then it's up to the policymakers to decide what policy in particular they would want to follow. And, I mean, there are some things that we can say that they should definitely be followed and some things that should be avoided. But when we get to the final details, it's really more on political decision. You know, for example, you could study within this framework what Germany has been doing to keep unemployment low. You could also study what Spain has been doing, which led to an increase in unemployment from something like 8 to 20% within a year. How can policymakers use your studies in order to.

[Moderator]

Well.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

I can tell you how they have used it. You know, for example, the New Deal for the unemployed was started a few years ago. The influence of one of my colleagues, of course, here is very much a policy that you could say that it's a good policy within the framework, because what our framework would suggest would be that you shouldn't allow the unemployed to remain unemployed for very long periods of time because they lose their skills, they lose the sort of mentality that is required to get another productive job. So something like the New Deal, where you would get the unemployed, you would give to the unemployed some work experience after, say, six months of unemployment, is something that would come out of the framework and would be recommended by the kind of framework that we have as a good policy response to increasing unemployment. Now, you could go beyond them, the countries that really champion policy recommendations that come out of our framework at the Scandinavian countries with rather refined policy towards unemployment.

[Journalist]

And.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

You can come with many different recommendations. For example, I can tell you one which is being tried now in some countries, and it's a good policy, which is to deal with rising youth unemployment, for example, by expanding higher education, providing more places, more subsidized places by the government. And at one and the same time, you're reducing unemployment and you're increasing the Productivity of the labor force through higher education. And it's something that's been quite successfully in Sweden at least.

[Moderator]

Yes.

[Audience Member]

In the current economic climate and government smashing budgets to smash deficits in this country as well as countries like Spain and Greece that face serious problems. How do you think these cuts will affect the wake up these. Would you be in favor of smaller budgets to deal with unemployment and restructuring or do you think it will be detrimental?

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

No, I don't think it would be detrimental. I would be in favor of smaller budgets to deal with unemployment. I wouldn't be in favor of unconditional cuts in public spending in the labor market because that could have bad effects on unemployment. But cutting the budget deficit and at the same time targeting some policies towards unemployment, cheaper policies towards unemployment could reduce the impact of the budget cuts on unemployment. Because the you could get quite far in dealing with unemployment with very inexpensive policies. I mean, dealing with unemployment directly. It doesn't have to be the result of expensive training and things like that. You could provide work experience. Not much more than what you would spend on unemployment insurance benefits, for example. Might the western world have been used to a higher structural unemployment levels? And if so, regardless what message you have? No, I don't think we need to have higher structural unemployment than we had before the crisis in the 2000s. You know, we had something like between 5 and a half and 6% in this country for many years. For example, the same in America. There's no reason why we shouldn't go back to those numbers now. The impact that the recession is now having. Unemployment is due to the recession. It's not due to any structural change in the economy that will necessitate higher unemployment. What policymakers could do now to stop structural unemployment building up is what I mentioned. Provided they maintain durations of unemployment low, there is no reason why structural unemployment should build up after the end of the recession. So it really deals more with durations now with the length of time that people remain unemployed. This should go back. I don't know yet actually. It's been so sudden since I got the phone call. My phone hasn't stopped since I got phone calls. So I need to recover. I was also, you can tell from my voice probably that I was in bed trying to recover from a very bad cold. So maybe the best way to celebrate is to get this recovery done. I was staying having trans recovery and then I was still in bed and then I thought, you know, I can't waste my entire day in bed an academic. So I got up, was walking around Trying to get my head to work and going to some reading and all that. And suddenly the phone rings and says, this is an important Are you Crystal episodes? I said, yes, it's an important phone message from Sweden. So it took me a surprise. I thought I was hallucinating for a moment. I'll take a few minutes to sit down and recover before I do anything else. No, I haven't even thought about money. Maybe. I say, I haven't been answering phone calls actually, so I don't know. The Cypriot president might have called. I'm not sure about the Prime Minister here. Thank you. I'll be talking to the Cyprus Broadcasting Corporation this evening.

[Moderator]

What would you like to say to people in Cyprus, I think was the.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Question, what would they like to say? Well, I'm really happy that they responded so well because I do know there were many phone calls from Cyprus. I mean, Cypriot always wasn't always moving kind of thing. So, I mean, I did keep very close contact with the island. So I'm really pleased.

[Moderator]

We've also got in the room a lot of colleagues I don't know, including the LSE director, Howard Davis. Howard, I don't know if you wanted to say anything at this point.

[Howard Davies]

I'm over the moon, Brian. No, I think this is fantastic as a school. Chris is also been one of those economics professors who is very visible to students who has always carried on teaching here and so we are absolutely thrilled. And he's someone who has been a member of the LSE for, well, longer than. Probably he would be pleased If I said 38 years.

[Moderator]

38 years.

[Howard Davies]

So he's been a one club man, as we say in football, which. So we are particularly thrilled by this. And the school will be finding ways of celebrating even if Chris goes back to bed.

[Moderator]

We had a question.

[Journalist]

Hello.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

We have seen a kind of deregulation in labor markets in many countries over the past couple of decades. So do you think it is a good thing for reducing the unemployment rate in general? I think so. Actually, it's a little bit more controversial, but I think the deregulation from the regulation that we had, say 1980 to now has been a good thing for unemployment. You see, despite the fact that not despite our work emphasizes what's known in economics as friction in labor markets. It doesn't necessarily mean sort of fighting each other, but it means that labor markets don't work as smoothly as other markets. Up to two years ago, we used to say yes, financial markets, but now we don't say anymore, but at least not as smoothly as goods markets. So you do need some regulation. There are a lot of monopolies for example that arise naturally in labor markets and do it. But there's a limit to how much regulation can go. You know, for example, I think some employment protection legislation in the form of protecting workers rights. I mean protecting workers jobs for employees is good but very limited Though not to the extent to which most countries including Britain had in 1980 and certainly not to the extent that Spain has it now, for example where they've created a two tier labor market through excessive regulation of one sector and no regulation in another. I don't think that's good for unemployment. Labor market.

[Moderator]

Yes please.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

No. Actually the only country that surprises me actually in the current recession unemployment. The only country whose unemployment surprisingly the current recession is the United States in fact which is surprising given that it's the country that we know most because of their statistical data and they have so many economists working on the problem. But it's a puzzle why unemployment has gone up by as much as it has in the United States and why labor productivity has risen by so much. There are different views by American economies but in other countries it's not too surprising given the extent of the recession if you see the way by how much output has fallen. For example Spain may have surprised some people but some Spanish economists have come up with convincing explanations as to why that has happened. But the American economists haven't provided any convincing explanations as to why US unemployment rate has gone up by as much as it has. Do you have any ideas about what that is? I think it's probably because American companies rely a lot more on external finance than companies in Europe and this recession is unusual in that what's threatening what has done is threatening to do more at least the uncertainty is not there yet is to cut the sources of external finance. And maybe they're being a little bit over cautious in hiring labor and they're collecting liquidity within the from internal funds just to be able to deal with any loss of source of funds from outside. I think that's probably the explanation is there but it hasn't yet been formulated very formally and rigorously.

[Colleague]

Maybe I could say something more on this performance.

[Moderator]

Sure, please do.

[Colleague]

Been a member of for 38 years.

[Moderator]

Yes.

[Colleague]

When he joined us he had already written a classic book on the working for the road market on which Noel PR is actually but of course. We had a fiction seminar I think for about 10 years where Chris is a key teacher of all of us I would say and we all learned.

[Moderator]

So much from him.

[Colleague]

So it's absolutely thrilling for everybody in what was then the center for labor, center for Economic Performance.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Thank you. In fact, all the work was done at the center for Labor Economics, in fact, with two short visits to the United States which were connected again with the center. One was at the, or the Ashenfelter Group at Princeton, but the center for Labor Economics at that time. It's the best way to set up the research sector because there was one issue that was a big problem, unemployment. And there was a small number of us being interested in that issue and just working on it over a 10 year period and feeding on each other and producing work. They were extremely influential work by Laird Nichols that was produced there. And it's really the way to run a research center. You should have the issue and have the people to work on and that's it.

[Moderator]

Just to explain for anyone who doesn't know, as Lord Layard pointed out, Professor Pisirides is a research fellow also at the Centre for Economic Performance, which is an autonomous research centre based here at. Just for anyone who didn't quite understand all of the academic acronyms that we sometimes throw at you, I don't know if anyone else has questions.

[Audience Member]

Yeah, please, if you could summarize yourself.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

How significant you think your work has been.

[Moderator]

Don't be modest.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

I'm not really the best person summarize that. And I didn't hear what the inaugural committee said this morning either because they had me on the phone in case they had any questions. So I can't even quote directly from what they said. No, I mean, what pleases me sometimes, what I see is that people, including policymakers, would talk about unemployment within a consistent, coherent framework that takes into account the rest of the economy. You know, it's not just, oh, you know, we must.

[Moderator]

I'm sorry. Yeah, you know, beg your pardon. You know, if you. That's my fault. I'm very sorry.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Yeah, no, as I was saying that I didn't hear what the inaugural committee said, so I couldn't quote directly. I'm sure they've done their, their homework and they'll get a better from them. But what pleases me though is that if you see what people, including policy makers, how they used to approach the problem of unemployment, how they used to talk about it in say 20, 30 years ago and how they talk about it now, it's very different now. I mean, we realize that although unemployment, it brings a lot of dissatisfaction with life and everything, it's also an economic problem which we have you have to look at it a little bit more objectively and see how it interacts with the rest of the economy and how decisions made by the unemployed themselves affects the outcome of unemployment in the economy, how policy would affect it and why, you know, how people respond to the incentives when they're unemployed and all those issues is really what our mind and my co authors approach to unemployment has been trying to do. Mainly to study the incentives that you could give to both unemployed workers and companies creating jobs, incentive for job creation, job acceptance by the unemployed and the job loss that might come after that when circumstances change. And it's really more like where we've been influential, is it in the way that I see people analyzing these things, you know, sort of using our framework rather than just vague statements. I don't know if that's clear. Probably not, No, but others have done, including two of my colleagues who are here. In fact, it's very similar. In fact, in some ways the models we developed are even more suitable for labor markets. Because you see the whole idea, one of the key ideas rather is that you cannot tell how good, you know, the way we analyze, you cannot tell how good a worker will be for you as a company unless you actually meet that worker, possibly hire that worker, have him produce for a little while and see how well matched he is to the requirements of your job. Well, in the housing market of course that applies more than anything. You know, when you see a house from the outside, you can't really tell how good a house will be for you and your family unless you go inside and even leave it for a while and see and learn all these quirks. So the model has been applied to the housing market with success in France.

[Moderator]

Okay, any more questions from the room? Right, what I'm going to do is attempt to try and bring in some people by phone in a minute. But as you may have gathered, it's taking me a while. So if anybody, I don't know if there's anyone who wants to follow up with a one to one interview, if so, now's a good time to mention that. So what I suggest we do, Chris, if it's alright, is if you wouldn't mind doing a couple of one to one interviews and then I'll queue up people on the phones as well. Okay, thank you very much. Sir.

[Journalist]

We have an interview with the Cyprus TV as well.

[Moderator]

I'm sorry.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

I hope so.

[Moderator]

Yeah, no problem.

[Phone Interviewer]

How exactly your theory may apply to emerging markets and descend in the labor market, especially in these countries. If you can Tell a bit about this.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Yes, with emerging markets, really, you would apply, you know, as emerging markets approach the OECD economies in the stage of economic development, then you will get into the situation, into the problems, if you like, of OECD economies, unless you do things differently. And when OECD economies were first moving up from emerging market status to developed status, if you take Southern European countries, for example, they make many mistakes, Many, many mistakes. Because when you are growing very fast, you think you can give lots of benefits to workers, you can put a lot of restrictions to safeguard jobs in other institutions that might arise in labor markets, but in fact, those are not very good when your rate of growth goes down again after you reach the sort of developed status. So it's best to avoid to introduce those things. And that's what our approach to labor markets and the whole unemployment problem is really telling you what policies to avoid in where when growing fast at your emerging market status, you know, for example, avoid what Spain has done, for example, and in Spain, it was all done when they were growing very fast, because when you are growing fast, then you can do almost anything you want to labor markets, and it will still perform well when there are more financial incentives being offered. Okay.

[Phone Interviewer]

Okay. Thank you very much. Congratulations again.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Thank you.

[Phone Interviewer]

Our next question comes from Maxala. Your line is open. Hello, Professor. Congratulations, first of all.

[Moderator]

Thank you.

[Phone Interviewer]

My question is about countries like Peru that are living a boom economy, but with high unemployment rates. And the government is trying to solve that with subsidies, for example, since many years ago. And it doesn't work, and it's not working right now. How can you apply the theory? And if you expect that this price would help to promote your theory and help to policymakers.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Latin American countries, actually not so much Chile, but even more Argentina, have made some of the mistakes of Southern European countries, maybe under Spanish influence. Historically. I don't know the way I would say, you know, given the state of economic development of your countries, of Chile and other countries, the way really to respond to it is very similar to the way we were saying before that Southern European countries should respond. I mean, subsidies should work if they are targeted well to the unemployed. You know, if you target them in a way that, say, you would get direct work experience to young people especially, but also to older unemployed, rather than spending them on training programs, which are very expensive and they don't yield very positive results. So I don't, I mean, I don't know the details of your programs. Be able to tell you it's because you've done A and not B, that subsidies haven't worked. But usually small subsidies can go a long way to reducing durations of unemployment. And then once the economy picks up again, then you would. Then unemployment should go down to low levels. But Latin American countries, though, generally they do have institutional structures through the labor unions, employees federations, the way they wage bargaining done, that are not very flexible, in my experience, of what I know about them.

[Moderator]

Thank you.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

That's it.

[Phone Interviewer]

Okay. Okay. Thank you, professor, but just one question. Do you expect that this prize will help to promote your studies and theory to policymakers?

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

I hope so, because I obviously think that it would be good if policymakers were. I mean, there has been a lot of policy response actually to our ideas, especially in Scandinavian countries, in the United Kingdom. And also, I would say even Spain and Italy did it, but not very well. But countries like the United Kingdom and Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Denmark in particular, in fact, have applied our ideas with a lot of success. So I hope Latin American countries do the same.

[Phone Interviewer]

Okay, thank you. Congratulations again.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Thank you.

[Moderator]

Do you have any further open?

[Phone Interviewer]

We have Another question for Mr. Davos. Your line is open.

[Journalist]

Yes, Hello, Professor Pizaridis. Congratulations, first of all.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Thank you.

[Journalist]

I'm calling on behalf of Sky Radio in Greece. So I would be very interested to know whether your theory, your work could be implemented in the country in the position that Greece is now with these strict measures, and whether it could be helpful.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Well, it could be. And in fact, we have made with some colleagues recommendations about Greece and what it could do in its labor markets. Now, I think couldn't. And there are many things that the Greek government could do, in fact, to reduce the problems in the labor market. You know, Greece, for example, has extremely low participation rates, especially from women, but also men. It has very early retirement age. You know, those. All those things are not good for labor markets. It has a very strong protection, job protection of those who are in jobs. You know, companies cannot get rid of workers easily when there is no more work to do. And when you get into that situation, then companies will be very wary before hiring any workers because they're worried that once they hire them, they might be stuck with them and not be able to get rid of them when they are no longer needed. You know, those reforms are essential and, and they could, and they really should be done alongside the other reforms that are taking place now. I know a little bit more about the Greek situation, as you can understand.

[Journalist]

Can I ask you just to say a word about your fellow Cypriots here in the UK and in Cyprus they feel really proud.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Oh, that they were. Well, I'm really happy by the response in Cyprus and Greece. I'm very attached to the country. I was on the monetary policy committee that brought the euro to Cyprus for 7 years I've watched the economy close hand and of course I went to school there and I ended up here partly because of the situation that it was going through over the last two or three or four decades. So I'm really happy. It was one of the things that made me happiest actually is that reaction there, the way they sort of embrace me as a Cypriot.

[Journalist]

Okay, thank you very much, Professor. Congratulations again.

[Christopher A. Pissarides]

Thank you.

[Phone Interviewer]

I'm showing no further questions.

[Moderator]

No, I don't think so. Maybe that's it. Do you have any further questions?

[Phone Interviewer]

No, I'm sorry, I'm showing no further questions.

[Moderator]

Okay, that's great. Thank you very much indeed then. Thank you.