EPRU Historically

EPRU was founded in the late Autumn of 1991 by a group of economists at the Copenhagen Business School and the University of Copenhagen with a common interest in International Economics and Public Economics. The goal of the group was to strengthen research on economic policy in open economies. The initiative was motivated by the huge changes in the international economy, the progressing economic integration in Europe, and the greater weight attached to structural policies in industrialized countries.

The group perceived a need to establish a research institution in Denmark which could strengthen research in this area. The aim was to contribute to the analysis of the process of international economic integration, and to develop theoretical and applied models to shed light on the effects of structural economic policies in small countries. The group also wanted to bridge pure theory and more applied economic analyses.

Until September 1998, EPRU was physically located at the Copenhagen Business School. At that time, EPRU moved into new offices in the third and fourth floors of the Department of Economics at the University of Copenhagen, reflecting the fact that most EPRU researchers had by then become affiliated with the university. As EPRU's research staff has expanded over the years, its research interests have broadened. Thus, while issues in Public Economics and International Economics have remained "core business" for EPRU, its research now also comprises topics in Macroeconomic Theory and Policy, Labor Economics, as well as Political Economy.

Today, nearly all EPRU members are researchers at the University of Copenhagen. The original founders of EPRU ― Svend E. Hougaard Jensen, Søren Bo Nielsen, Lars Haagen Pedersen, Pascalis Raimondos-Møller, Peter Birch Sørensen and Niels Thygsen ― are all affiliated with either the Centre for Economic and Business Research (CEBR) at the Copenhagen Business School, the DREAM-group in the Danish Ministry of Finance or the Economic Policy Research Unit (EPRU) at the University of Copenhagen. In total more than forty economists are research fellows or analysts at CEBR, DREAM and EPRU, and the three groups collaborate through the Economic Policy Research Network (EPRN).