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Ongoing Research
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Flagship Activities
Flagship activities are large-scale research projects usually accomplished with the combined efforts of ECES and other regional and international organizations or individuals. Flagship activities generally take a minimum of one year of planning and typically culminate in a large event such as a conference and several subsequent publications. |
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Privatization in Egypt: Short-Term Challenges and Long-Term Opportunities
With the adoption of the Economic Reform and Structural Adjustment Program in Egypt in 1991, a wave of privatization of companies in several sectors followed. Since then, privatization has initiated a growing debate on the positive and negative implications of this policy. Merits of privatization include promoting competition, increasing productivity and efficiency, increasing capital and investments in the privatized companies, hence increasing activity, exports and employment. In addition, privatization has been expected to boost investor confidence, promote FDI, deepen and broaden domestic equity market and reduce the fiscal deficit. Notwithstanding these expected merits, the gains from privatization are not perceived by various stakeholders to be equitably distributed. There are mounting concerns about income and wealth being transferred from workers and consumers to capitalists. There are also concerns about monopolistic behavior, as well as irrational allocation of resources and mismanagement when companies are sold to employees’ associations.
Few studies have assessed the impact of privatization whether at the micro or the macro level. Moreover, the scope of these studies was too narrow, and was limited to a small number of companies. In addition, fewer indicators were used.
This study aims at assessing the impact of privatization on the companies from a wider perspective. The assessment is conducted in terms of the financial performance of privatized firms, as well as employment, investment, competitiveness, exports and governance. The assessment includes the total population—rather than a sample—of the privatized companies (reaching 88 companies).
Labor Market Analysis: Education, Flexibility and Productivity
Egypt has recently made significant strides towards reviving economic growth. However, the unemployment rate remains persistently high and high growth rates have not resulted in significant increase in job opportunities for the growing labor force.
The research aims at addressing the imbalance between labor supply and demand in Egypt, substantiating on three pillars: education, labor market flexibility, and productivity. Four topics are envisaged for thorough analysis:
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Private versus public enterprises: wage flexibility, employment agreements, productivity, profitability, turnover, human capital and competition. |
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Labor market constraints: gender distribution, unemployment, wage segmentation, and skills. |
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Education and human capital skills: employment by education, wages by education, return on training, return on higher education, and turnover based on training and higher education. |
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The impact of wage adjustment on inflation and growth: disaggregate analysis of sectoral labor market indicators and their impact on aggregate employment, inflation, growth, competitiveness, investment and exports. |
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