Robert Breunig

Professor and Director, Tax and Transfer Policy Institute

Qualifications

Ph. D. (Economics), University of California Riverside, 1998

Bachelor of International Studies, School for International Training, 1987

Contact details

Phone: +61 2 6125 2148

Room: Crawford 3.28

robert ! breunig () anu ! edu ! au

breunig_cv.pdf

Research policy briefs

As described here, these are:

2-page summaries of published academic research in an easy-to-read format
written for policy makers who want to use evidence to evaluate policy
intended to lift debate and increase dialogue between academics and policy makers

Research Policy Briefs

Zhang, J. and R. Breunig (2023) “Female breadwinning and domestic abuse: Evidence from Australia”.
Lancsar, E., E. Huynh, J. Swait, R. Breunig, C. Mitton, M. Kirk and C. Donaldson (2023) “Preparing for future pandemics: a multi-national comparison of health and economic trade-offs”.
Breunig, R. and T. Sainsbury (2023), “Too much of a good thing? Australian cash transfer replacement rates during the pandemic”.
Hathore, C. and R. Breunig (2022), “Occupational Mobility in the ALife data: how reliable are occupational patterns from administrative Australian tax records?”.
Majeed, O. and R. Breunig (2022), “Determinants of Innovation Novelty: Evidence from Australian Administrative Data”.
Fabian, M., R. Breunig and J. De Neve (2022), “Explaining the Return of Racial Voting: Economic Anxiety, Psychological Wellbeing and Identity”
Agarwal, A., S. Arfin, R. Breunig, S. Weldeegzie and T. Zhang (2021), “Nationalism and Economic Openness: The cross-country evidence”.
Hasan, S., S. Shakur and R. Breunig (2021), “Exchange rates and expenditure of households with foreign-born members: evidence from Australia”.
Hasan, S. and R. Breunig (2021), “Article length and citation outcomes”.
Van Kints, M. and R. Breunig (2021), “Inflation Variability across Australian Households: Implications for Inequality and Indexation policy”
Sainsbury, T. and R. Breunig (2021), “The urgent need for tax reform in Australia in the COVID-19 world”
Sainsbury, T. and R. Breunig (2021), “Tax planning in Australia’s income tax system”
Bakhtiari, S., R. Breunig, E. Magnani and J. Zhang (2020), “Financial Constraints and Small and Medium Enterprises: A Review”
Freestone, O. and R. Breunig (2020), “Risk aversion and the Elasticity of Intertemporal Substitution among Australian households”
Breunig, R. and O. Majeed (2019), “Inequality, Poverty and Economic Growth (PDF, 61KB)”
Breunig, R., S. Hasan and K. Whiteoak (2019), “Value of playgrounds relative to green spaces: Matching evidence from property prices in Australia (PDF, 64KB)”.
Breunig, R. and O. McCarthy (2019), “Household Telecommunications Expenditure in Australia (PDF, 64KB)”.
Fabian, M. and R. Breunig (2019), “Long work-hours and job satisfaction: Do over-workers get trapped in bad jobs? (PDF, 63KB)”.
Carter, A. and R. Breunig (2019), “Do earned income tax credits for older workers prolong labor market participation and boost earned income? Evidence from Australia’s Mature Age Worker Tax Offset (PDF, 69KB)”.
Breunig, R., S. Hasan and B. Hunter (2018), “Financial Stress and Indigenous Australians (PDF, 112KB)”.
Deutscher, N. and R. Breunig (2018), “Baby Bonuses: natural experiments in cash transfers, birth timing and child outcomes (PDF, 125KB)”.
Gong, X. and R. Breunig (2018), “Channels of labour supply responses of lone parents to changed work incentives (PDF, 113KB)”.
Breunig, R., N. Deutscher and H. Thi To (2018), “The relationship between immigration to Australia and the labour market outcomes of Australian-born workers (PDF, 115KB)”.
Breunig, R., X. Gong and G. Leslie (2015), “The Dynamics of Satisfaction with Working Hours in Australia: The Usefulness of Panel Data in Evaluating the Case for Policy Intervention (PDF, 64KB)”.

Follow-up:

Please get in touch if you would like to discuss our research or the state of knowledge on the research topic. No questions are off limits! We are happy to present our research to your department but also happy to come and talk to you about:

Your paper doesn’t answer the question we’re interested in. Can you help us to figure out a way to answer the questions that really interest us?
Can you help us evaluate a policy that we have implemented?
We’re thinking about some new policies. Can you help us implement the policy in a way that will make it easy for us to find out whether it worked or not?
Why is empirical research important?
What is all this technical stuff about statistical significance and causal impact and should we worry about it?

Case Studies

Below are case studies prepared by students in the Crawford School of Public Policy as part of the course POGO8081: Economics for Government. Please feel free to use and cite. Feel free to suggest additional case study topics that you would like to see.