Gilles Saint-Paul is Professor at the Toulouse School of Economics,  and Scientific Advisor to the Economic Studies Directorate at the French Ministry of the Environment. He did his PhD at MIT (1987‑90) with Olivier Blanchard and Michael Piore. He has been an advisor to the French, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, British governments on labour market matters as well as to the IMF, IADB and European Commission. He has published four books and authored numerous articles in the top journals including a number path breaking contributions on the political economy of labour market reform. He is a CEPR Research Fellow and has been Director of the CEPR Labour Economics Programme since 2001. His research has explored the factors influencing technological progress and growth, the political economy of unemployment and how information technology affects wage inequality.