Eric Baird French (born in Santa Barbara, California) is the Montague Burton Professor of Industrial Relations and Labour Economics at the University of Cambridge. He is also a Co-Director at the ESRC Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy, a Fellow at the Institute for Fiscal Studies and a Fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research. His research interests include: econometrics, labour and health economics.
Academic career
French received a B.A. in Economics with highest honours from the University of California, Berkeley in 1992. He received a M.S. in 1997 and a PhD in 1999 in Economics, both from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. French worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago between 1999 and 2013, holding the positions of Economist, Senior Economist, and Research Advisor. In 2013, French was appointed as Professor of Economics at the University College of London (UCL). After working at UCL for seven years, he is currently the Montague Burton Professor of Industrial Relations and Labour Economics at the University of Cambridge.
French has also had visiting positions at Northwestern University in 2007, Northwestern-Kellogg in 2010, the Social Security Administration in 2008-9, the Cowles Foundation (Yale University) in 2012, and the Federal Reserve of Minneapolis in 2003, 2013 and 2018, as well as shorter stays at the Atlanta Fed, New York Fed, and Georgetown University. He has served on the Executive Committee for the Michigan Retirement Research Center since 2012.
French's research has been published in Econometrica, Review of Economic Studies, American Economic Review, Journal of Political Economy, Handbook of Labor Economics, Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, Handbook of Aging and the Social Sciences, Annual Review of Economics, Review of Economics and Statistics, the Journal of Labor Economics, International Economic Review, Journal of Applied Econometrics, Journal of Human Resources, Economic Journal, Fiscal Studies, American Economic Journal: Policy, Lancet, and other publications.
He presently serves as an editor of the Journal of Labor Economics (2020–present). He has also served as editor of the Journal of Pension Economics and Finance (2016–20) and Fiscal Studies (2013-16), as well as on the editorial boards of Quantitative Economics (2009–16), Economic Inquiry (2008-10), and Journal of Pension Economics and Finance (2010–16).
Publications
French has written over 40 papers and articles on topics in: medical expenditures of the elderly, minimum wage, disability insurance, Social Security reforms and pensions. Some of his noteworthy papers and articles are:
"Industry Dynamics and the Minimum Wage: A Putty-Clay Approach" (2018), with Daniel Aaronson, Isaac Sorkin and Ted To. They develop a model of industry dynamics based on putty-clay technology, which is consistent with the documented response of the restaurant industry to minimum wage hikes. "The Effect of Disability Insurance Receipt on Labor Supply" (2016), with Jae Song. The paper estimates the effect of disability insurance on labour supply. It is shown that 30% of denied applicants and 15% of allowed applicants work several years after a disability determination decision. "The Spending and Debt Response to Minimum Wage Hikes" (2012), with Daniel Aaronson, and Sumit Agarwal. They find that immediately following a minimum wage hike, household income rises on average by about $250 per quarter and spending by roughly $700 per quarter for households with minimum wage workers. Most of the spending response is caused by a small number of households who purchase vehicles. "The Minimum Wage, Restaurant Prices, and Labor Market Structure" (2008), with Daniel Aaronson, and James MacDonald. The paper introduces a model of employment determination that investigates the empirical increases in restaurant prices in response to minimum wage hikes. "The Effects of Health, Wealth, and Wages on Labor Supply and Retirement Behavior" (2005). French estimates a life cycle model of labour supply, retirement, and savings behaviour in which future health status and wages are uncertain.
French has also led an international collaboration of economists studying medical spending around the world. Some publications in this area include: