I am currently a first year PhD candidate at CREST (Ecole Polytechnique - ENSAE) supervised by Prof. Roland Rathelot and Prof. Arne Uhlendorff, and a research economist at the Institut des Politiques Publiques (Paris School of Economics) in its labor market division.
My research focuses on labor economics, econometrics and policy evaluation. I also study research questions in international trade.
I am also the director, co-founder and editor in chief of Oeconomicus, an online journal that promotes the results of economic research, makes it accessible to public debate, and brings together actors of the academic community to enhance the understanding of research in economics as well as their research.
Contact me by mail pierre.rousseaux@ensae.fr/pierre.rousseaux@polytechnique.edu
or follow my research and activities on...
New Paper !
Identifying European trade dependencies, 2024, with I. Mejean; in Pisani-Ferry, J, B Weder Di Mauro and J Zettelmeyer (eds), Paris Report 2: Europe's Economic Security, CEPR Press, Paris & London.
CEPR Bruegel Paris Report, Reports webpage, CEPR's Paris Symposium 2023
Media: Bruegel's podcast, VOXeu Column
Abstract: We review and extend upon existing literature using product-level trade data to identify trade dependencies that expose the European Union to potential disruptions. While acknowledging the significance of concentrated foreign input sourcing as a source of vulnerability, a comprehensive assessment of vulnerabilities should also consider the potential for substituting away from disrupted input sources, both domestically and abroad. This may necessitate devising novel statistical measures at the European level. We present a novel methodology that identifies trade dependencies by integrating these substitution sources. Our review encompasses normative arguments justifying public interventions to improve the resilience of value chains. We intersect our identified dependencies with a measure of geopolitical risk, their upstreamness in the value chain, and also focus on critical products and strategic green technologies. The specific targeting of these policies varies depending on the nature of risks they aim to mitigate. Finally, we discuss the range of policy tools available for crafting a resilience policy.
This figure sequentially shows how our additional criteria impact the set of vulnerabilities imported by the EU. Beginning with 5,381 products imported by the consolidated EU from 2015-2019 (we aggregate trade and production data to focus on persistent dependencies), the European Commission's three criteria (from its "bottom-up approach") identify 378 vulnerable products. Restricting the set to products for which 50% of domestic absorption is satisfied by extra-EU imports reduces it to 228 products. Finally, by considering ex-post substitutability in the event of a shock affecting these products, we identify 49 strategic dependencies after narrowing down to those (among the 228) with very low substitutability between suppliers. This last set of vulnerabilities accounts for 0.5% of the EU's total imports.