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PhD Studentship: Economics


ESRC PhD Studentship: Economics

Swansea University -College of Business, Economics and Law

Introduction:
Swansea University, the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the ESRC Wales Doctoral Training Centre (DTC) are offering a fully-funded PhD studentship: An Investigation into the Impact of Disability on Employment in the UK.
About the project:
Despite disability being associated with substantial labour market disadvantage there is a shortage of disability research within Labour Economics. This PhD will contribute to the evidence gap by analysing existing UK micro-data including the Annual Population Survey (2004-present) and Life Opportunities Survey (launched in 2009). This analysis will be enhanced by exploratory investigation of newly linked administrative (health) data to survey data (via the Secure Anonymised Information Linkage (SAIL) Databank located within the Health Information Research Unit (HIRU) at Swansea University) which will assess the additional insights that can be offered by data linking.
The project will focus on the following three areas relating to the employment of individuals with disabilities:
  1. The sensitivity of the experience of disabled individuals to the business cycle is debated. This research will examine the prevalence of disability and associated employment disadvantage during the current prolonged economic downturn.
  2. Initial evidence highlights the importance of public sector employment for disabled individuals. This research will explore how this has changed over time and aspects of public sector employment, including important organisational policies.
  3. Existing evidence predominately considers disability from an individual perspective whereas, this analysis will focus on the household context particularly, the incidence of disability and its contribution to workless households.
Swansea University is part of the £4.8 million Wales Institute of Social & Economic Research, Data & Methods (WISERD) Research Centre funded by the ESRC and HEFCW. The centre, led by Cardiff University, involves academics from Swansea, Aberystwyth, Bangor and Glamorgan. This is a joint project involving collaboration with Swansea University and Cardiff University under the supervision of Professor David Blackaby (Swansea), Professor Phil Murphy (Swansea) and Dr Nigel O’Leary (Swansea).
Candidate eligibility: 
The studentship is only available to candidates from the UK/EU.
You should have a master’s degree in Economics, with a strong quantitative background.
Studentship value:
The studentship provides funding (fees and maintenance) for up to 3 years and offers:
  •  Full UK/EU tuition fees.
  •  A maintenance stipend of £16,590 per year.
  • £250 per year for other expenses (e.g. conferences, fieldwork).
Further information:
Please contact Dr Melanie Jones at m.k.jones@swansea.ac.uk for further information. 
Application closing date:  
The application closing date is 26th April 2013
To apply online click the APPLY online button.
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