News & Events

Events

• On 2 July, we released the 2025/2026 Luxembourg Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) Report (Pdf). This year’s report, and additional material, is available at this link.
• Our Measuring Progress Annual Workshop in June brought together leading researchers to discuss how societies can create better lives for current and future generations, with 35 presentations covering individual-level determinants of well-being, AI, beyond-GDP measures, the environment, and quality of life. Keynote speakers Ida Kubiszewski and Andrew Oswald inspired discussions on sustainable well-being and the impact of social media on human well-being.
• On 24 June 2026, Cesare Riillo presented the main findings from “Immigration and Entrepreneurship across Europe” at the Workshop and Policy Roundtable “Designing a Competitive Luxembourg: Housing, Mobility, and Talent for the Future”, organised by the Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) Policy Lab.
• STATEC Research, with a contribution from Cesare Riillo, in collaboration with the Ministry of the Economy and the Banque centrale du Luxembourg, provided Luxembourg data for the report Financing SMEs and Entrepreneurs 2026: An OECD Scoreboard. Watch the full recording of the OECD launch event here.
• The National Productivity Board report was released in February, with two chapters prepared by our productivity team: one examining the role of intangible assets in driving productivity growth, and another tracking key productivity indicators in Luxembourg.
• On 16^th October 2025, Cesare Riillo presented the main findings from the 2024/2025 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) report for Luxembourg, titled “Entrepreneurship grows in Luxembourg as AI provokes both optimism and fear” at the House of Entrepreneurship in Kirchberg.
• In July, we hosted the International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies (ISQOLS) conference in Luxembourg, welcoming 470 participants from nearly 70 countries over 4 days. The event featured 4 keynotes, a roundtable, and 440+ presentations—including 20 special sessions—focused on the theme: "Redefining Progress: Achieving Sustainable Well-Being for All." See news coverage by the Chronicle.lu here and here, and by InfoGreen (Fench).

STATEC Research in the News

• The study on “Determinants of profitability of firms in Luxembourg”, by Evgenii Monastyrenko and Giovanni Mangiarotti, featured on paperjam.lu and lessentiel.lu.
• The GEM report received notable recognition and was highlighted on science.lu under the title “Entrepreneuriat au Luxembourg : 9,9 % des résidents ont lancé une entreprise en 2024”. It was also selected as one of the 10 studies for October by Research Luxembourg, in the article titled “Entrepreneurship on the Rise in Luxembourg, with AI and Sustainability in Focus”.
• Paperjam (French) discussed our team’s planned contribution to World Happiness Report 2025, focusing on deaths of despair and pro-social behavior around the world.
• Highlighted by Research Luxembourg as one of ten notable research results in July, Francesco Sarracino and Kelsey O’Connor published “Governments should prioritize well-being over economic growth” in the renowned journal Nature Human Behaviour. See the news release here. 
• The Luxembourg Times and chronicle.lu reported the release of the GEM Report 2023-2024 (Pdf) in May 2024.
• L'essentiel (French), Luxemburger Wort (German), and Paperjam (French) featured our study, “Dissatisfied employees are three times more likely to quit: Evidence from the Luxembourg Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (Pdf)”.

Recent Grants, Awards, & Recognition

• In June 2024, “Neo-humanism and COVID-19: Opportunities for a socially and environmentally sustainable world,” authored by Francesco Sarracino and Kelsey O'Connor, and published in the Applied Research in Quality of Life Studies, received the 2023 Best Annual ARQOL Paper Award from the International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies.
• Giulia Slater was awarded the 2024 Best Dissertation Award for her doctoral thesis, "Essays on Social Capital and Wellbeing" from the International Society for Quality of Life Studies (ISQOLS). In addition, she received the ISQOLS 2024 Post-Doc Research Fellowship, a grant intended to support one postdoctoral candidate conducting research in quality-of-life, happiness, and/or wellbeing studies.
  

Presentations

• On 24 June 2026, Cesare Riillo presented the main findings from “Immigration and Entrepreneurship across Europe” at the Workshop and Policy Roundtable “Designing a Competitive Luxembourg: Housing, Mobility, and Talent for the Future”, organised by the Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) Policy Lab, as well as at Entrepreneurship and Inequality Workshop organised by Copenhagen Business School (CBS).
• In June, Golnaz Amjadi and Charles-Henri DiMaria presented “Eco-efficiency Gaps: Evidence from European Countries” and “Intangibles in Tangible Productivity Discrepancies” at the European Workshop on Efficiency and Productivity Analysis (EWEPA XIX) in Munich, Germany.
• In June, Francesco Sarracino delivered a keynote speech on “Measurement and analysis of subjective well-being in large-scale surveys” at Sociological Forum "Social Research in the Digital Age: Trends and Challenges" organized by Kazakhstan Institute for Strategic Studies (KazISS) and Narxoz University.
• In May, Giulia Slater and Nikos Rigas presented “Pro-social behaviours and GDP” and “Analyzing countries ability to transform their resources into well-being using WHR” respectively at the Renaissance in Economics 3rd International Conference organized by University of Rome Tor Vergata in Italy.
• In April, Nikos Rigas presented “Analyzing countries ability to transform their resources into well-being using WHR” at 10^th International Conference on Applied Theory, Macro and Empirical Finance (AMEF) organized by University of Macedonia in Greece.
• In March, Cesare Riillo presented “Gender and Immigration as Drivers of Sustainable Entrepreneurship: Insights from Luxembourg, Canada and Germany” at the 18th Workshop on Labour Economics in Trier, Germany.
• In March 2026, Francesco Sarracino delivered a keynote speech on “Economic possibilities for our grandchildren reloaded” at ISQOLS regional conference organized by University of Palermo in Argentina.
• In March 2026, Cesare Riillo presented “Gender and Immigration as Drivers of Sustainable Entrepreneurship: Insights from Luxembourg, Canada and Germany” at 18th Workshop on Labour Economics organized by the Institute for Labour Law and Industrial Relations in the European Union (IAAEU) in Trier, Germany.
• In March 2026, Giulia Slater presented “The trust paradox”,  “Supporting Others: How prosocial behaviour reduces deaths of despair”, and “Panel Discussion on Mental Health, quality of life and Social capital” at the Social Capital Conference 2026 organised by International Social Capital Association, online.
• In February 2026, Nikos Rigas presented “Rebound Effect – A Sisyphean Effort or a Chimera? Evidence from Transient, Persistent and Energy Efficiency in European Industries” at the 2026 Energy and Climate Economics and Business Days organized by University of Groningen.
• In January 2026, Francesco Sarracino delivered a keynote speech on “When economic growth improves subjective well-being” at 9th Annual Political Economy Meeting organized by University of Porto in Portugal.
• In January 2026, Cesare Riillo presented “Entrepreneurship and Income Inequality:  Evidence from Cross-Country Pseudo Panel Data” at the Economic Seminar organized by DEAMS, University of Trieste in Italy.
• In February 2026, Kelsey O’Connor presented “How to measure and (not) achieve societal progress” at the Human Well-being Beyond GDP: Towards Holistic Measures of Development For Viksit Bharat @2047 (Pdf) organised by Department of Economics Gurugram University, Haryana, India.
• In January 2026, Giulia Slater presented “The Costs of Social and Environmental Degradation in Affluent Economies” at the Giessen Economics Seminar at the University of Giessen in Germany.
• In December, Kelsey O’Connor presented “Does Well-being Governance Enhance Well-being?” at the OECD Meeting, held online.
• In December, Kelsey O’Connor presented “Does Well-being Governance Enhance Well-being?” at the Örebro International Seminar at Örebro University School of Business, Sweden.
• In December, Fengyu Wu presented “Social Capital Shapes the Relationship Between Well-being and Spending” at the UAntwerpen CSB Lunch Seminar Series in Antwerp, Belgium.
• In December, Cesare Riillo presented “Immigration and Entrepreneurship in Europe: Cross-Country Evidence” at the Entrepreneurship Seminar at the University of Luxembourg.
• In November, Nikos Rigas presented “Rebound Effect – A Sisyphean Effort or a Chimera? Evidence from Transient, Persistent and Energy Efficiency in European Industries” at the II Energy Policy Workshop in Valencia, Spain.
• In November and December, Cesare Riillo presented the Luxembourg Global Entrepreneurship Monitor 2024/2025 at the Chamber of Commerce and Ministry of the Economy in Luxembourg.
• In November, Francesco Sarracino presented “PIBien-être: Measuring Quality of Life in Luxembourg” at the OECD Workshop on Conceptualizing and Assessing Sustainable Well-being in the Slovak Republic, held online.
• In October, Cesare Riillo presented “Entrepreneurship and Income Inequality:  Evidence from Cross-Country Pseudo Panel Data” and “Gender along the stages of social entrepreneurship ” at the International Conference on Entrepreneurial Motivation, held online.
• In October, Francesco Sarracino presented “When Does Economic Growth Improve Subjective Well-being?” at the Brainstorming Session on Beyond GDP and International Development at the OECD in Paris, France.
• In October, Cesare Riillo presented “Entrepreneurship and Income Inequality: Evidence from Cross-Country Pseudo Panel Data” and “Gender and Immigration as Drivers of Sustainable Entrepreneurship: Insights from Luxembourg, Germany, and Canada” at the Sixth International ZEW Conference on the Dynamics of Entrepreneurship (CoDE) in Mannheim, Germany.
• In October, Nikos Rigas presented “Rebound Effect – A Sisyphean Effort or a Chimera? Evidence from Transient, Persistent and Energy Efficiency in European Industries” at the 11th Conference on the Economics of Natural Resources and the Environment, held online.
• In October, Fengyu Wu presented “Consumption Expenditures, Social Capital, and Subjective Well-being: Evidence from Australia” at the 10th Luxembourg Workshop on Household Finance and Consumption in Luxembourg.
• In September, Francesco Sarracino presented “When Does Economic Growth Improve Subjective Well-being?” at the Workshop in Honor of Richard Easterlin at the Paris School of Economics in Paris, France.
• In September, Xi Chen presented “How Does Relative Positioning in the Global Value Chain Affect Labour Productivity Growth?” at the 27th INFER Annual Conference in Rome, Italy.
• In September, Nikos Rigas presented “Analyzing Well-Being Efficiency Using the World Happiness Report” at the 11th International Workshop on Efficiency in Education, Health and Other Public Services in Budapest, Hungary.
• In September, Kelsey O’Connor presented “The Easterlin Paradox” at the Workshop in Honor of Richard Easterlin in Paris, France.
• In September, Cesare Riillo presented multiple papers — including “Gender Along the Stages of Social Entrepreneurship,” “Are Happy People Successful Entrepreneurs?”, “Immigration and Entrepreneurship in Europe: Cross-Country Evidence,” “Entrepreneurship and Income Inequality: Evidence from Cross-Country Pseudo Panel Data,” “Entrepreneurship and Growth: A Structural Equation Model and a Composite Index,” “Improving SME financing measurement: AnaCredit data for the OECD scoreboard in Luxembourg”, and “Leveraging Large Language Models to Decode Luxembourg’s Entrepreneurial Ecosystem” — at the G-Forum Conference on Entrepreneurship in Stuttgart, Germany.
• In September, Cesare Riillo presented “AnaCredit and the SME Financing Scoreboard: The Experience of Luxembourg 2025” at the Informal Steering Group on SME and Entrepreneurship Financing (OECD) in Paris, France.
• In July, Francesco Sarracino presented “Happier and Sustainable: The Neo-humanist Path to Post-growth Societies” at the International Society for Quality of Life Studies (ISQOLS) Annual Conference in Luxembourg.
• In July, Giulia Slater, Fengyu Wu, and Nikos Rigas presented “The Costs of Social and Environmental Degradation in Affluent Economies”, “Consumption Expenditures, Social Capital, and Subjective Well-being: Evidence from Australia”, and “Analyzing Well-Being Efficiency Using the World Happiness Report” respectively at the WISER Annual Meeting and the International Society for Quality of Life Studies (ISQOLS) Annual Conference in Luxembourg.
• In July, Kelsey O’Connor delivered two presentations — “Supporting Others: How Prosocial Behaviour Reduces Deaths of Despair” and “The Happiness Revolution in Europe” — at the International Society for Quality of Life Studies (ISQOLS) Annual Conference in Luxembourg.
• In July, Cesare Riillo presented “Are Happy People Successful Entrepreneurs?” at the International Society for Quality of Life Studies (ISQOLS) Annual Conference in Luxembourg.
• In June, Kelsey O’Connor presented “Does Well-being Governance Enhance Well-being?” at the the Renaissance in Economics 2nd International Conference in Florence, Italy.
• In June, Golnaz Amjadi presented “Eco-efficiency Gaps: Evidence from 22 European Countries” at the 31st Ulvön Environmental Economics Conference in Ulvön, Sweden.
• In June, Nikos Rigas presented “Analyzing Well-Being Efficiency Using the World Happiness Report” at IAMO 2025 in Halle (Saale), Germany.
• In June, Fengyu Wu presented “The Health Impacts of Relaxing Internal Migration Policies: Quasi-experimental Evidence from China” at the International Association for Applied Econometrics Annual Conference in Turin, Italy.
• In May and June, Francesco Sarracino presented “The Trust Paradox” at the 2nd Welfare & Policy Conference in Bordeaux, France, and at the Renaissance in Economics 2nd International Conference in Florence, Italy.
• In May and June, Giulia Slater presented “The Costs of Social and Environmental Degradation in Affluent Economies” at the 2025 RSA Annual Conference – Navigating Regional Transformation in Porto, Portugal, the Renaissance in Economics 2nd International Conference in Florence, Italy, and the ISEE Degrowth 2025 Conference in Oslo, Norway.
• In May, Kelsey O’Connor presented “Does Well-being Governance Enhance Well-being?” at the 2nd Welfare & Policy Conference in Bordeaux, France.
• In April, Fengyu Wu presented “The Health Impacts of Relaxing Internal Migration Policies: Quasi-experimental Evidence from China” at the Workshop on Labour Economics 2025 (Pdf) at Trier University, Germany.
• In April, Fengyu Wu presented “The Health Impacts of Relaxing Internal Migration Policies: Quasi-experimental Evidence from China” at the 2nd Welfare & Policy Conference, in Bordeaux, France.
• In March, Fengyu Wu was invited to present “Supporting Others: How Prosocial Behaviour Reduces Deaths of Despair” at the World Happiness Report Asian Launch, held online.
• In March, Francesco Sarracino gave an update on WP5 at the WISER Mid-term Review Meeting, held online.
• In March, Kelsey O’Connor presented “Analyzing Well-Being Efficiency Using the World Happiness Report” at the WISER Workshop South Africa in South Africa.
• In February, Francesco Sarracino presented “Neo-humanism for a Sustainable Urban Future” at the Global Urban Lectures organised by UN-Habitat, held online.
• In February, Cesare Riillo presented “Leveraging Large Language Models to Decode Luxembourg’s Entrepreneurial Ecosystem” and “Gender and Immigration as Drivers of Sustainable Entrepreneurship: Insights from Luxembourg, Germany, and Canada” at the GEM Annual Meeting in Bilbao, Spain.
• In February, Chiara Peroni presented "Are happy people succesful entrepreneurs?" as part of the School of Economics seminar series organised by the University of East Anglia in Norwich, UK.
• In February, Kelsey O’Connor presented "The happiness revolution in Europe" as part of the Measuring Progress Seminar Series organised by STATEC Research in Luxembourg.
• Fengyu Wu, Giulia Slater, and Kelsey O’Connor presented the papers "Mitigating life challenges to subjective well-being through civic engagement: Insights from a global perspective", "Estimating defensive consumption: The cost of social and environmental disruption", and "Does well-being governance enhance well-being?" at the BeWell Meeting 2025 (Pdf) organised by the BeWell Network and Freie Universität in Germany, in February.
• In February, Cesare Riillo presented "Entrepreneurship and income inequality: Evidence from cross-country pseudo panel data" at the 2025-2nd III/LIS Comparative Economic Inequality Conference 2025 in Luxembourg.
• In January, Francesco Sarracino presented “STATEC Research: Organization and research topics” at the Annual Retreat of the ACROSS PhD School in Luxembourg.
• In January, Giulia Slater presented "The trust paradox" at the Civil economy: An old-new paradigm conference, organised by LUMSA University in Rome.
• Xi Chen was invited to present "Intangible capital and labour productivity growth in Luxembourg" at the Economic Policy Committee organised by the European Commission in January in Brussels.