POPNET Connects with Zoltán Elekes

Using Swedish register data for regional and network science

Drawing on statistical registers, Sweden offers world-class microdata resources for quantitative research. The register data covers the entire population of Sweden in a panel structure, also matching workers to workplaces. As such it provides detailed information on individuals, workplaces, firms and regions over time. In this talk I will give an overview of the use of this dataset, and provide examples of ongoing research based on it in the context of regional and network science. This part will first cover inferring coworker networks to explain individual, firm and regional outcomes. Second, I will show how constructing skill-relatedness networks enables the study of individual wage-mobility, the economic resilience of local labour markets, and helps informing regional policy on economic diversification.

About Zoltan Elekes

Zoltán Elekes is engaged in research on topics at the intersection of evolutionary economic geography and network science. He holds a PhD in economics from the Doctoral School of Economics, University of Szeged, Hungary since 2018. In his thesis he explored how multinational enterprises and import influence the economic diversification of microregions. He is a research fellow at the ANET Lab of the Centre for Economic and Regional Studies in Hungary, where he studies the geography of collaborative knowledge production and supplier-buyer networks. He leads a research project at the Centre for Regional Science at Umeå University, Sweden on how the network structure of local labour markets condition regional economic resilience. He has published in leading field journals including Regional Studies and European Planning Studies, and has refereed for Economic Geography and Regional Studies among others. Zoltán is the 2019 recipient of the Excellent Young Regional Scientist Award of the Hungarian Regional Science Association, the Hungarian section of ERSA. Since 2019 he has been engaged on multiple occasions in consulting policymakers in Swedish regions on smart specialization and regional economic development. He continues to mentor students in Hungary, and contributes to the Network and Spatial Analysis course developed by the ANET Lab.

About POPNET Connects

POPNET Connects is the seminar series of the Population Scale Network Analysis (POPNET) platform. We invite everyone to join the seminar, connect with others and get involved in discussion. Interested in joining? Send us an email or sign up for our mailing list.