Dr. Lei Xu is a Lecturer in Economics at the Business School of Bournemouth University. Lei obtained his Ph.D. in Economics at the University of Dundee in 2018. He joined the Department of Accounting, Finance, and Economics in 2021 after working at the National Institute of Economic and Social Research for more than 3 years.

Lei is a micro-economist with research interests in economics of education, and labour economics broadly defined. His research primarily relies on novel identifications due to pervasive confounding factors in many non-experimental observational studies. His research focuses on estimating the production function in secondary education, the selection of fields of education and occupation, work-based learning with a special focus on apprenticeships, and career mobility. His work so far has explored topics including the returns to higher education, apprenticeships, housing prices, peer effect, teaching practices, migration, and minimum wage.

Lei Xu joined IZA as a Research Affiliate in September 2022.