General information about the Institute
The Institute for Economic Research (IER) is an independent research organisation founded in 1965 by the merger of two independent scientific institutes, the Institute of Economics and the Institute of Economics, Statistics and Demography in Ljubljana, and transformed into a public research institute in 1998. It is the largest independent research institution in the field of economics in Slovenia. Our mission and the driving force behind our activities is to create basic knowledge and conduct cutting-edge international research in the field of economics that is relevant for the sustainable development of the Republic of Slovenia. Our research focus is based on the research programme "Slovenia's New Development Strategy in the EU", which is complemented by the implementation of a number of projects in the national and international environment: basic, applied and targeted research projects supported by the Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency and various ministries, development projects and expertise for a wide range of governmental and other institutions, and international projects implemented mainly within the framework of EU programmes. We also carry out consultancy projects for individual companies and other organisations. Our research work follows the objectives of the Slovenian Development Strategy 2030, and therefore focuses on the study of economic, social and environmental development factors, as well as the intergenerational and spatial dimensions of sustainable development, and on the study, development and application of methodological tools that enable the production of expert bases for the implementation of the Slovenian Development Strategy, thus contributing to a rapid and effective response to the strategic and current needs of economic policy makers.
For many years, the Institute has been participating in various consortia and groups that provide independent information, analyses and expertise in the field of public policy for the European Commission and other clients, such as European Social Policy Network, IMD, WEF, High Level Group on pensions, EuroGender Network, DG Regio Expert Evaluation Network, European Reference Budgets Network, International Network on Leave Policy and Research, the Demography Network, and the Working Group on the Mid-Term Evaluation of the European Fund for Strategic Investments. The Institute's researchers are members of international advisory bodies and/or bodies of scientific or professional associations such as the Society for Financial Econometrics, the Society for Economic Measurement, the Royal Economic Society, the European Economic Association, the American Economic Association, the Study Group on Exports and Productivity, The European Trade Study Group, Econometric Society, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, EuroQol, ISPOR, Statistical Society of Slovenia, and editorial boards such as Panoeconomicus, Health Care, Review of Economics and Economic Methodology, Revija za socijalnu politika, EconomistsTalkArt. org, The SHARE Blog, Demográfia English Edition. The diverse cooperation with numerous international and national organisations, universities, research and development institutes and other non-governmental organisations contributes significantly to the promotion of the Institute's activities and thus to the affirmation of Slovenian science at the European and global level.
The Institute's work to date has demonstrated its ability to successfully contribute to solving key systemic and socio-economic problems in Slovenia and the European Union. The Institute is therefore one of the few institutions from Slovenia to be ranked among the top think tanks in the world - in 2020 it was ranked 27th in the category "Top Think Tanks in Central and Eastern Europe" (up from 36th in 2014) and 79th in the world in the category "Top Domestic Economic Policy Think Tanks".
