After completing his master’s studies in Oxford, Matthew worked for nine years as an economist at the Institute for Fiscal Studies. While there he studied for his PhD at University College London. A major theme of Matthew’s research has been the consumption and saving decisions of individuals and how these are affected by public policies and by the real and financial assets that are available. He has published in general interest journals such at the Journal of the European Economic Association, the Scandinavian Journal of Economics and Economica; and in field journals such as the Review of Economic Dynamics and the Journal of Health Economics. He also contributed to the influential “Mirrlees Review” of the principles behind the design of tax and benefit policy and their application to the UK.
Education
PhD Economics, University College London, 2009
PhM Economics, St John's College, 2000
BA (1st Class Honours) Philosophy, Politics and Economics, St John's College, 1998
We estimate marginal propensities to consume from wealth shocks for Italian households in the early part of the Great Recession. Large asset price shocks in 2008 underpin an IV estimator. A euro fall in risky financial wealth resulted in cuts in annual total (non‐durable) consumption of 8.5‐ 9 (5.5‐5.7) cents. There is evidence of effects on food spending. Responses of total and nondurable spending to changes in housing wealth are 0.2 to 0.3 cents/euro. Point estimates of the effect of the financial wealth shock are larger if the youngest and/or oldest households are excluded. Results indicate that responses to the wealth shock were stronger for those who became pessimistic about the stock market, and for those owners of risky assets who also held mortgage debt. Counterfactuals indicate financial wealth effects were important (relative to other factors) for consumption falls in Italy in 2007/08.
Using survey data spanning multiple house-price cycles over nearly forty years, this paper documents the association between house prices and homeownership at age thirty.
This paper uses a realistic structural lifecycle model of consumption and housing decisions to understand how data might distinguish different mechanisms that explain the correlation between house prices and consumption.
Contrary to the conventional wisdom that the Stakeholder Pension reforms had little or no impact on saving behaviour, our results indicate that the change to the contribution ceilings affected private pension coverage rates among lower-earners, especially among women.
This paper analyses the likely implications of the temporary cut in VAT in the UK to 15 per cent, with a return to 17.5 per cent in place for the end of 2009.
