About
PMCA Economic Consulting
PMCA Economic Consulting is an Irish-owned and Irish-based business active in the provision of evidence-based economic analysis to clients in the public, private and other sectors in Ireland and other countries. The firm was founded in 2010 by Dr. Pat McCloughan, a leading consultant economist with over 30 years’ professional experience in Ireland, the UK and internationally. A PhD-educated economist with an established publication record in peer-reviewed economics journals and with advanced training and skills in statistics and econometrics, Dr. McCloughan is active in the principal practice areas of economic consulting, namely economic impact assessment, economic appraisal, competition, regulation, litigation support as an expert witness economist, and economic strategy.
Experience
During 2001-2010, Dr. McCloughan worked in a senior capacity with another economic consulting firm with offices in Dublin, London and Europe. Prior to that (between 1993 and 2001) he was employed at the University of Liverpool – as a Lecturer in Economics and during 1998-2001 he was also Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Department of Economics, Finance and Accounting, which became part of the University of Liverpool Management School. During 1991-1993, Dr. McCloughan was a Lecturer in Economics at the University of East Anglia, Norwich in the UK, where he obtained his PhD degree in Economics.
Clients
Dr. McCloughan is known and respected for the integrity, independence and rigour of his work. Clients include (but are not limited to) central government departments, local authorities (city and county councils), State agencies, educational institutions, private sector enterprises and business representative organisations.
Ireland’s Medium-Term Economic Strategy (MTES) 2014-2020
A high profile example of Dr. McCloughan’s consultancy portfolio over the past decade is his work for the Irish Department of Finance, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, the Department of An Taoiseach and the Office of An Tánaiste regarding the preparation of Ireland’s Medium-Term Economic Strategy (MTES) 2014-2020, which Dr. McCloughan carried out between September 2013 and the deadline of 15 December 2013, the set date for Ireland’s exit from the Economic Adjustment Programme overseen by the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund (together the ‘Troika’) following the Banking Crisis and Great Recession in 2008.
Expert Economist Advisor to the Banking Crisis Inquiry in Ireland
Not long after the project concerning Ireland’s MTES, Dr. McCloughan was involved in another high profile assignment, namely the provision of expert economist advice to the Members (TDs and Senators) of the Joint Oireachtas Committee which inquired into the causes and impacts of the Banking Crisis in Ireland. This consultancy assignment was carried out during November 2014-March 2015, primarily at Oireachtas Éireann (the Parliament of Ireland), Leinster House, Kildare Street, Dublin.
Economic Consultancy Work
Dr. McCloughan has carried out a large and wide range of economic consultancy assignments in the fields of economic impact, economic appraisal, competition and regulation, and economic strategy.
Qualifications and Awards
Dr. McCloughan’s academic qualifications are: BA (Hons) Economics and Mathematics (National University of Ireland Galway, NUIG); MA Economics (NUIG); and PhD Economics (University of East Anglia, UK).
He was awarded prizes for his higher education achievements, including Postgraduate Fellowship for his MA studies at NUIG and Research Postgraduate Scholarship for his PhD work at UEA. He won the (Europe-wide) 1992 Young Economist Essay Competition, awarded at that year’s Annual Conference of the European Association for Research in Industrial Economics, Stuttgart, Germany. This prestigious award is granted to young economists (under 30 years) who submit particularly outstanding and innovative research papers to the annual conference.
In 1996, whilst lecturing in economics at the University of Liverpool, he was awarded a UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) bursary to attend the University of Warwick Summer School for Research in Economics. He also gained ERSC doctoral research awards to attend various economic research conferences and workshops during his PhD studies at UEA.
Publications
Dr. McCloughan has published in peer-reviewed economics journals, including The Journal of Industrial Economics, Applied Economics, The International Journal of Industrial Organisation, Construction Management and Economics, Applied Economics Letters, The Economic and Social Review and The Journal of the Statistical and Social Inquiry Society of Ireland (the latter two journals are the leading economics journals in Ireland).
He has also published in Global Competition Review, The Journal of Cross Border Studies in Ireland, Telecommunications Policy, European Competition Law Review and Pleanáil – Journal of the Irish Planning Institute.
Original Contributions to Economics
Dr. McCloughan’s contributions to economics are original techniques for estimating economic inequalities and concentration given pre-grouped data (over which the researcher/economist etc. has no control).
Working with Dr. Esmaiel Abounoori, Professor of Econometrics and Social Statistics at Semnan University in Iran (who originally met Dr. McCloughan whilst a Visiting Fellow at the University of Liverpool in the 1990s), Dr. McCloughan developed a formula enabling accurate estimation of the Gini Coefficient given grouped data which is derived and applied with an example using independent data (to illustrate the accuracy of the method) in the following publication: Abounoori, E. and McCloughan, P. (2003) ‘A simple way to calculate the Gini Coefficient for grouped as well as ungrouped data’, Applied Economics Letters, 10:8, pp. 505-509.
The corresponding concentration ratio formula for the case of grouped data is derived and illustrated in the publication: McCloughan, P. and Abounoori, E. (2003) ‘How to Estimate Market Concentration given Grouped Data’, Applied Economics, Vol. 35, pp. 973-983.
Shown on the right are the Abounoori-McCloughan estimators for the Gini Coefficient and the concentration ratio given grouped data, which is often the only available data encountered in practice from publicly available information sources. The first formula is the original formula for the Gini Coefficient and the second and third formulae make up the AM estimator for the Gini Coefficient given grouped data. The fourth formula is the general expression for the k-entity (e.g. firm) concentration ratio while the fifth formula is the AM estimator for the k-entity (e.g. firm) concentration ratio given grouped data.
