As part of the Places You’ll Go series, this interview with Margarita Pavlova follows a CERGE-EI student’s research stay at Yale University — a journey shaped by academic ambition, unexpected confidence, and the search for the right intellectual environment. What began as a strategic step to advance a Job Market Paper became a much broader experience of growth: from engaging with leading scholars in labor economics to discovering that top academic spaces are not only demanding, but also deeply energizing. In this conversation, she reflects on choosing Yale, navigating the road to the US, and what the experience taught her about research, collaboration, and believing in her own ideas. Continue reading Research, Risk, and Growth: My Time at Yale
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Meet our alumni: Coming home to build impact
After graduating from CERGE-EI, Mária Valachyová returned to Slovakia and built a career in private banking that led her to her current role as Head of Strategy at Slovenská sporiteľňa (Erste Group). In this interview, she reflects on the key turning points that shaped her path, the real-world impact of research and strategy on households and businesses, and the innovations her team is delivering. Continue reading Meet our alumni: Coming home to build impact
When delayed retirement reshapes the workplace. Talking Economics Emerging Scholars with Sona Badalyan
Most research on retirement asks a simple question: when do people choose to stop working, and why? In the newest episode of Talking Economics Emerging Scholars, CERGE-EI job market candidate Sona Badalyan takes a different angle. She looks at raised retirement age as something that also happens to firms and coworkers—a change that can ripple through promotions, hiring, and peer effects. Continue reading When delayed retirement reshapes the workplace. Talking Economics Emerging Scholars with Sona Badalyan
From Copenhagen to Chicago—A PhD Year on the Move
In our Places You’ll Go series, we follow CERGE-EI students as they take their research abroad and bring new ideas back to Prague. In this interview, a CERGE-EI PhD student Ilisa Goenka (Quantitative Macroeconomics, Household Finance, Behavioral Macroeconomics) reflects on a high-intensity year filled with study stays at the University of Copenhagen (spring) and the University of Chicago (fall), with an additional visit to Princeton University as a Stapleton Scholar. In the interview she shares what it takes to integrate fast, stay productive, and make the most of short windows in top research environments. Continue reading From Copenhagen to Chicago—A PhD Year on the Move
Boston Bound: Study Stay at MIT
In this entry of the Places You’ll Go series, we follow Maksim Smirnov, a CERGE-EI PhD student, to MIT for a spring research stay shaped by one goal: sharpening a job market paper in the right intellectual home. Drawn by MIT’s strength in instrumental variable models and an unusually welcoming econometrics community, the visit became both a research accelerant and a crash course in academic connection. Continue reading Boston Bound: Study Stay at MIT
Meet Our Alumni: Regulation, Competition, and the Digital Economy
Our Phd alumnus, Viliam Druska, is Senior Director of Regulatory Economics at Ooredoo in Doha, Qatar. After starting out in a technical field, he transitioned to economics during the region’s shift to a market economy and went on to build a career in telecommunications. In this interview, Viliam shares the key choices behind his journey, explains what regulatory economics looks like in practice, and reflects on why balancing short- and long-term incentives matters for investment. Continue reading Meet Our Alumni: Regulation, Competition, and the Digital Economy
Conclave Insider: Game Theory of Choosing a Pope
The papal conclave is often portrayed as a closed, ritualized event. But behind the secrecy lies a voting procedure with clear strategic logic. In this interview, CERGE-EI faculty Jan Zápal introduces the study Electing the pope: Elections by repeated ballots which he coauthors with Clara Ponsati. It explains how the pope is elected through repeated rounds requiring a two-thirds majority, why this system can in principle last for months or even years, and how economists model such elections to understand what kinds of winners the rules tend to produce. Along the way, they connect the conclave to other institutions that use similar repeated voting, and argue that long-standing rules can also confer legitimacy on the final choice. Continue reading Conclave Insider: Game Theory of Choosing a Pope
From Prague to Chicago to Princeton, via the New York Fed
What starts as a single email can turn into a research-shaping journey. As Gayane Baghumyan, a PhD student and aspiring experimental economist at CERGE-EI, describes in this Places You’ll Go interview, it unfolded like this: a CERGE-EI–supported research stay became six months at the University of Chicago, hosted by John List, followed by a Stapleton Award–funded visit to Princeton and a conference stop at the New York Fed. Along the way, she discovered an intense seminar culture, world-class faculty who were unexpectedly down-to-earth, and “random conversations” that sharpened her research design and broadened her view of how economics can influence the world. Continue reading From Prague to Chicago to Princeton, via the New York Fed
Intangibles, Innovation, and Competition: A Conversation With the Econometric Society Best Paper Awardee
In this interview, the recent AMES-CSW Best Paper Award 2026 recipient Cagin Keskin discusses the ideas behind his award-winning research, which explores how firms’ diversification decisions shape innovation, competition, and long-term economic growth. He reflects on the methodological innovations that made the project possible, the policy questions it helps answer, and how this work fits into his broader research agenda on the role of intangibles and firm heterogeneity in modern economies. Continue reading Intangibles, Innovation, and Competition: A Conversation With the Econometric Society Best Paper Awardee
Investing in Excellence: Five Years After the Alumni Excellence Fellowship
The Student Support Fund was created to attract talented students to CERGE-EI and enable them to focus fully on their studies. In 2019, two students became the first recipients of the Alumni Excellence Fellowship—one of them was Maksim, who is now completing the PhD program and entering the international academic job market.
Five years later, we look back at what the Fellowship meant for him, how it shaped his development at CERGE-EI, and why alumni support continues to play a crucial role for future generations.
Continue reading Investing in Excellence: Five Years After the Alumni Excellence Fellowship