Beyond the BRICs: Where do the pockets of opportunity lie? - Ep 1

Are we out of the woods yet? In this podcast, Ellie Golden hosts our UK Chief Economist Barret Kupelian, along with Jake Finney, a manager in our Economics team, to discuss their views on the macroeconomic outlook and the reports special article, which offers a holistic evaluation on undergraduate degrees. The speaker's outline their views on GDP growth, the outlook on headline inflation and what recent geopolitical developments could mean for domestic prices in the UK.

Free school meals can have a great impact on both children and wider society. Join us as we discuss the potential expansion of free school meals in England, looking at who currently receives them, what the potential benefits to children and society are from expanding this policy, and what we expect to happen next.

Overall success is heavily dependent on effective employee adoption, and without this, businesses struggle to see the true benefits of their time and financial investments. So, what insights can behavioural economics provide to help navigate change and get good habits to stick? And how did we apply these insights in practice to drive an 81% increase in employee adoption of technology within 2 months?

Are you value-sensitive or time-sensitive? Active or dormant? Proactive or a procrastinator? These questions are at the heart of Behavioural Segmentation, an approach to segmentation that makes nudges significantly more effective at influencing behaviour. The integration of behavioural science into customer insight is proving to be a powerful accelerator for businesses to understand their customers and, more importantly, use that insight to drive value for them and their customers alike. 

To discuss how putting these approaches helped Sage increase customer satisfaction and reduce churn, host Freddie Martin is joined in the studio by Suresh Natarajan, who leads the PwC Behavioural Economics practice, and Brian Wall, Director of retention at Sage.

Link to our previous Behavioural Economics episode: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/economics-in-business/id1231389294?mt=2

Link to the PwC Behavioural Economics site, where you can learn more about how PwC can help you harness the power of Behavioural Economics:

https://www.pwc.co.uk/services/economics/behavioural-economics.html

In this episode, Freddie Martin discusses the results of PwC's latest Good Growth for Cities index with George Mason, an economist at PwC, and James Bowman, a South-East and London PwC Consulting partner specialising in local government transformation. Ten years after its launch, and as we recover from another global crisis, we reflect on what economic wellbeing really means, and how policymakers can support levelling up for the recovery across the UK's regions. 

For the full results of the report visit our dedicated site. 

You can listen to the Business in Focus podcast on Good Growth for Cities and local recovery strategies on the PwC site, iTunes or Spotify.

Projecting what the future holds is an important exercise for businesses and governments looking to plan ahead. In this podcast, Hannah Audino speaks to Barret Kupelian and Rob Clarry from PwC's Economics team to discuss the key trends we expect to come to the fore in the global economy in the year to come. You can read more in our latest Global Economy Watch: https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/research-insights/economy/global-economy-watch/predictions-2021.html

In this episode our co-host Freddie Martin is joined by Steve Davies, PwC's Global Blockchain leader, and Jonathan Gillham, who leads PwC UK's Economics team, to discuss blockchain, the technology that is revolutionising how we share and store data, with the potential to add an estimated $1.76 trillion to the global economy by 2030.

To find out more, please visit PwC's blockchain page, where you can download a copy of our 'Time for Trust' report and explore the results of the analysis mentioned in this episode: https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/technology/publications/blockchain-report-transform-business-economy.html