Annual Review 2025-2026 - The Economics, Inequality & Opportunity Programme

Abstract:

When I joined Oxford and took over directorship of INET's Economics, Inequality & Opportunity Programme in October 2025, I benefited from the kind of luck that every new director hopes for: inheriting an already stellar research programme from Brian Nolan. In the past year, we have expanded to 20 core researchers from across the social sciences, and we now face a daunting challenge: how should we understand, measure, and prepare for changes in inequality amidst rapid advancements in artificial intelligence? 

Thus far, we have embraced that challenge with creativity and experimentation. We formed an LLMs Subgroup, meeting regularly to ask how we could use generative AI to advance the study of inequality itself. We have experimented with new forms of collaboration, such as an open, unstructured, 'contribute-at-will' model for producing academic research. And we have opted for a virtual, outward-facing seminar series, the INET Oxford Inequality Working Group, that has brought together nearly 500 researchers from outside Oxford to engage with Dani Rodrik on 'productivism', Anthropic economist Maxim Massenkoff on the effects of AI on jobs, and representatives of the European Commission on the EU Anti Poverty Strategy.

More broadly, we have organised our work around four priority areas: (1) poverty and income inequality, (2) social mobility and economic opportunity, (3) labour markets, and (4) the use of LLMs in inequality research. You will find examples of our team's work in these areas in the pages to follow.

Our first year closes as we host the Atkinson Conference on Economic and Social Inequality. On September 10th and 11th, 100 academics will gather at Nuffield to deliberate on the measurement, causes, and consequences of inequality. The conference's namesake, the late Sir Anthony B. (Tony) Atkinson, combined careful measurement and rigorous analysis with serious policy consideration. Tony was fixated not only on measuring and understanding inequality, but also on What Can Be Done to reduce it. The Atkinson Conference, and our team's work more broadly, aims to carry that focus forward.