Asian Economic Integration Report, 2019/2020: Demographic Change, Productivity

November 14, 11:00pm - 1:30pm
Mānoa Campus, John A. Burns Hall, Room 4005 (Fourth Floor), 1601 East-West Road Add to Calendar

Please join us for a Public Seminar on the Asian Development Bank's Asian Economic Integration Report, 2019/2020

The Asian Economic Integration Report is an annual publication that documents Asia’s progress in regional cooperation and integration. The 2019/2020 report features a theme chapter on “Demographic Change, Productivity, and the Role of Technology” which explores the role and potential of technology in boosting the productivity of an aging economy. It also discusses how countries in the region can best promote and adopt innovations that can turn demographic challenges into opportunities and dividends.

At this public seminar, following opening remarks by EWC Vice-President Karena Lyons and ADB Chief Economist and Director General Yasuyuki Sawada, the Chief Economist will present the report’s key findings. A discussion on technology’s role in boosting productivity in an aging economy will follow, featuring panelists:

Sang Hyop Lee, EWC Senior Fellow and Professor, University of Hawaii at Manoa
Kathleen McGarry, Professor, University of California Los Angeles
John Piggot, Director, ARC Centre of Excellence in Population Ageing Research
Aiko Kikkawa Takenaka, Economist, ADB

The program will run from 11:00-12:30 pm followed by lunch from 12:30-1:30 pm. This event, including lunch, is free and open to the public. Seating is limited. Because we are serving lunch, we ask that you PLEASE RSVP by Nov. 12 at 944-7111 or EWCInfo@EastWestCenter.org

Paid parking is available on UHM campus

Co-hosted by the Asian Development Bank and the East-West Center Co-sponsored by the College of Social Sciences, UHM and the School of Pacific and Asian Studies (UHM)

Asian Economic Integration Report 2019/2020: Panelists

YASUYUKI SAWADA is the Chief Economist of the ADB and Director General of its Economic Research and Regional Cooperation Department. Mr. Sawada is the chief spokesperson for ADB on economic and development trends and leads the production and dissemination of ADB’s flagship knowledge products, as well as ADB’s support for various regional cooperation forums such as ASEAN+3 and APEC. Before joining ADB, Mr. Sawada was Professor of Economics at the University of Tokyo. He did research in a variety of institutions, such as the Japan International Cooperation Agency Research Institute and the World Bank, where he led a number of large-scale development policy evaluation projects in Asia and other developing countries. His key research areas are macro- and micro-development economics, microeconometrics, economics of disasters, and field surveys and experiments. Mr. Sawada obtained his PhD in economics and his master’s degree in international development policy from Stanford University.

SANG-HYOP LEE is a professor of economics at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and a senior fellow at the East-West Center. He is also the chairperson of the Executive Committee of the National Transfer Accounts project (http://www.ntaccounts.org) which involves researchers from more than 70 countries around the world. Mr. Lee's research focuses on issues related to individual and population aging, such as topics on labor market, pension and retirement, fiscal policy, and social welfare. He has been investigator of numerous projects and has collaborated with many international agencies and governments. He has published numerous articles including 10 books. His recently edited books include Demographic Dividend and Population Aging in Asia and the Pacific (2016); Social Policies in an Age of Austerity (2015). Mr. Lee received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in economics from Seoul National University, and PhD in economics from Michigan State University.

KATHLEEN MCGARRYis a Professor in the Department of Economics at UCLA and a Research Associate at the NBER. From 2007-2009 she was the Joel Z. and Susan Hyatt, 1972 Professor of Economics at Dartmouth College. McGarry previously served as a Senior Economist at the Whitehouse Council of Economic Advisers and has had fellowships from the Brookdale Foundation and the NBER. Ms. McGarry’s research focuses on the economics of aging, particularly on the roles of public and private transfers in affecting the well-being of the elderly, and on insurance markets catering to the elderly. Within the context of transfers, Ms. McGarry has examined issues such as the effect of Social Security on living arrangements, participation in the SSI program, and the transfer of cash and time assistance between parents and children. Her work on health insurance and long-term care has examined the burden of out-of-pocket expenditures faced by the elderly, particularly near the end of life and the effect of caregiving on labor force participation. She is a co-investigator for the Health and Retirement Study.

JOHN PIGGOT is Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence in Population Ageing Research (CEPAR) at UNSW Australia, where he is Scientia Professor of Economics. Dr Piggott has published widely in retirement and pension economics and finance, and in public economics more generally. His Australian policy experience includes membership of both the Henry Tax Review Panel and the Ministerial Superannuation Advisory Committee, internationally; he worked for nearly a decade with the Japanese Government on the economic implications of an ageing population; and he has undertaken consultancies and contract research for several foreign governments and international organisations on ageing and retirement issues. In 2018, he was awarded a Rockefeller Residency to undertake research into ageing and inequality in Asia, and in the same year was appointed co-chair of the G20 Population Ageing Taskforce. Currently, Dr Piggott is a member of the United States Academy of Medicine’s International Commission on Creating a Global Roadmap for Healthy Longevity.

AIKO KIKKAWA TAKENAKA is Economist at the Economic Research and Cooperation Department of ADB. She covers research portfolio of aging and demographic changes, international migration and remittances, tourism, and regional research collaboration. Prior to joining ADB, she was with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) where she led the development and implementation of technical assistance programs on migration and overseas employment policy, remittances and financial literacy, and disaster relief operation targeting mobile population. Ms. Kikkawa obtained her PhD in development economics from the National Graduate Institute of Policy Studies (GRIPS), Japan, and master’s degree in forced migration from the University of Oxford, United Kingdom.


Event Sponsor
East-West Center, Mānoa Campus

More Information
EWCinfo@eastwestcenter.org

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