Irene Bertschek

Dr. Irene Bertschek is a Head of Digital Economy at ZEW-Leibniz-Zentrum für Europäische Wirtschaftsforschung.
In May 2019, she was appointed as a member of the Commission of Experts for Research and Innovation (EFI), advising the Federal German government.
In July 2022 she was appointed to the Future Council by Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
In her research, she investigates how digitalization changes economic processes and how it affects firms’ labour productivity and innovation activity.
Her methodological expertise lies in the field of microeconometrics and the analysis of firm-level data.
She studied Economics at the University of Mannheim and at the Catholic University of Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium, focusing on industrial economics and econometrics.
She attended the European Doctoral Program and obtained a doctoral degree in economics from the Catholic University of Louvain.