Univ.-Prof. Dr. Tobias Thomas
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| Univ.-Prof. Dr. Tobias Thomas is Professor of Economics at the Graz Schumpeter Center (GSC) of the University of Graz, Vice Chair of the Austrian Council of Economic Advisors (“Productivity Board”) and former Director General of the Austrian Federal Statistical Office (“Statistics Austria”). Thomas is an international economist with extensive experience in leadership positions in the public and private sector. From 2020-2025 he was Director General of the Austrian Federal Statistical Office (“Statistics Austria”) and represented Austria internationally in the European Statistical System Committee (ESSC), the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC), the United Nations Conference of European Statisticians (UNCES) and the OECD Committee on Statistics and Statistical Policy (CSSP). During his term, the research data infrastructure Austrian Micro Data Center (AMDC) was established, Statistics Austria achieved excellent results in the peer review of the European Statistical System (ESS) and the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) decided that Austria becomes a full member of the world’s highest statistical body, the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC) in New York, for the first time since 1983. Previously, Thomas was Director of the economic research institute EcoAustria in Vienna (2017-2020), Research Director of an international media analysis institute with headquarter in Zurich and regional offices in Hanoi, New York and Pretoria (2013-2016), and Director of Economic Policy and Director European Economic Policy at the German Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Berlin and Brussels (2008-2013). Thomas is member of the Standing Field Committees on Economic Policy as well as on Economic Systems and Institutional Economics of the German Economic Association/Verein für Socialpolitik (VfS). In addition, he is member of the Science Advisory Board of the Complexity Science Hub Vienna (CSH) and Research Affiliate at the Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE) of Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, where he was Lecturer and Professor of Economics from 2012 to 2024. Thomas served as Vice President of the Austrian Statistical Society (ÖSG, 2020-2024), scientific expert at the Austrian Pension Commission (2019-2023), and member of the Commission Future of Statistics (KomZS, 2022-2025) for the strategic planning of the German Federal Statistical Office (Destatis). After studying economics at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn and the Technische Universität Berlin, Thomas received his doctorate summa cum laude from the Helmut-Schmidt-Universität in Hamburg, where he also gained his habilitation. Thomas was a visiting scholar at, among others, Columbia University in New York (USA) at the invitation of Nobel Prize winner Joseph E. Stiglitz and at the Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance in Munich at the invitation of Kai A. Konrad. In his research at the interface between economics and psychology, Thomas analyses decision-making processes and behavior in economic and political contexts. His research interests include public finance, competitiveness, reforms, and media impact. Other areas of focus include data science, data governance of complex data ecosystems, as well as building and improving research data infrastructure facilities. Thomas appears regularly in national and international media. In the ranking of the most influential economists by Die Presse, F.A.Z. and Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Thomas was ranked 5th in Austria in 2019 (2018: 6th place). Since 2020, he has no longer been listed due to his position as Director General of Statistics Austria. In 2024, Thomas was quoted 1,699 times in the media (2023: 1,788; 2022: 1,601 times). |
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