Economics Conference at SOAS

On Tuesday 12 and Wednesday 13 July, nine boys studying economics travelled to London University’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) to attend a conference organised in association with The Latymer School.

On the first day the boys were warmly greeted by Dr Koestle-Cate, previously of Habs Boys, and were thoroughly fascinated by a talk given by Cordelia Kafetz, currently at the Bank of England on Banknotes and digital currencies. The talk encompassed her career path and role at the Bank of England and boys were given the chance to handle the exciting new ‘un-tear able’ Polymer banknotes. The second talk by Robert Robinson was on starting a new business, giving an insight into the slow but steady growth of small businesses. Boys were then given the chance to become entrepreneurs by pitching a new idea to the rest of the conference and receiving feedback from Robert. 

The final talk of the day was on an interesting new topic; microfinance and its benefits to the growth of small businesses in developing countries. The boys also had a thoughtful debate on the motion ‘does microfinance have the same goals as traditional banks?’

Day two of the Latymer conference brought a plethora of engaging talks and speakers. The day started off with Stephen Brown from the Bank of England Audit team introducing the economic context within which the Bank makes its decisions, and focusing the audience on the true “value” of money. Attention in session two focused on the passionate stances the speakers took during question time, where unsurprisingly, given the circumstances, the debate centred on the effects of Brexit. The audience, unanimously in favour of remaining, as a final snap poll would show, rigorously interrogated Professor David Myddelton (Cranfield School of Management) on his pro-Brexit stance, while Dr Hassan Hakimian (SOAS) took a more impassioned remain stance. This gave the audience a chance to ask leading experts, face to face, about some of the misgivings and uncertainties they had about the true meaning and consequences of Brexit. 

After lunch Dr Hannah Bargawi (SOAS) managed to retain the attention of a well-fed audience talking about the differences in the effects on men and women of the financial crisis (called a he-cession by some) and the policies later implemented to deal with it. This opened the budding student economist to the variety of different subsets of economics available for one to study of which gender economics is undoubtedly a growing and engaging one. 

The final talk of the day by Dr Ramin Nassehi was on the problem of growing income and wealth inequality. He gave his view, on how to stop growing inequality, proposing the high taxation of inherited wealth. A very engaging speaker, Dr Nassehi ended the Latymer conference leaving a lot to ponder upon for all future economists both at Habs and the other schools present. A successful end to a successful conference!