Background

 

Joe Branigan is an Australian public policy economist with 25 years’ experience working in government, academia and private sector consulting.

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Joe is an independent economic consultant through his firm Tulipwood Economics where he specialises in network and supply chain economics, particularly in relation to the national energy, water, telecommunications (digital economy), and transport networks. Joe has deep expertise in health policy and has taught health economics at Masters level. He is also a Senior Associate with Professor Henry Ergas’ AO consulting firm Green Square Associates where he has assisted Professor Ergas on several complex competition economics consulting assignments, including legal cases. Joe also works as an Associate with a number of specialist economics consulting firms, and also collaborates with 'Big-4' professional services firms as a 'subject matter expert', particularly in relation to transport and infrastructure policy.

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Joe has held a number of consulting, research, teaching or business development positions with Australian universities, where he’s been a trusted advisor to senior executives. Joe was a Senior Research Fellow at the SMART Infrastructure Facility UOW for 7 years where he led the Infrastructure Economics Research Group.

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Joe is a former economic advisor to the American Ambassador to Australia. He was a regulator (electricity) with the Queensland Competition Authority. Early in his career, Joe worked at the Productivity Commission and then Federal Treasury. He began his career as a graduate economist with the Queensland Treasury Department.

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Skills & Expertise

-  Applied microeconomics and public policy, including network economics, competition policy, economic and fiscal impacts of government policies (esp. on regions), and analysis of economic reforms in various markets.

-  Project and program evaluations, including cost benefit analysis (CBA) and economic impact analysis (IO, CGE) of proposed investments and policies.

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Industry Specialisation

Network industries (energy, transport, telecommunications and digital economy, water markets), environmental tourism and indigenous heritage, resources economics (incl. mining, agriculture and water), health economics and policy, regional economic development, cities policy (incl. social housing), trade policy, fiscal policy.

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Academic Qualifications

Bachelor Economics (Honours), University of Queensland

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Awards

-  Franklin Award (US State Department, 2006)

-  International Visitor Leadership Program (US State Department, 2010)

-  Paper of the Year, Australasian Journal of Regional Studies (2018)