Competition Economics Specialist

Division - Competition

Department – Competition Economics

Salary - National (Edinburgh and Leeds) ranging from £67,100 to £95,000 and London £73,700 to £104,000 per annum (Salary offered will be based on skills and experience)

About the FCA

The FCA regulates the conduct of 45,000 firms in the UK to ensure our financial markets are honest, fair and competitive. Follow this link to find out more About the FCA.

This role is in the Competition Division (CD). CD leads the FCA's competition mandate and much of our work is focused on ensuring markets are working well for consumers.

Within CD sits the Competition Economics team. Our aim is to apply our unique mix of expertise in competition, economics, and quantitative analytical frameworks, working together to:

• Describe and diagnose poor outcomes or harm, and how these could stem from ineffective competition
• Identify where competition issues might exist currently or in future, and which to prioritise
• Build robust evidence on those issues and advise on the best way to remedy or mitigate issues by taking proportionate action where appropriate

As a specialist economist, you will play a key role leading the competition and economic analysis on our major projects such as market studies and competition enforcement projects in a variety of financial services markets. You will be a key member of the team, demonstrating leadership, supporting the team managers in developing team strategy and leading on relationships with stakeholders. This role may also involve formally line managing up to two Associates.

What will you be doing

You will work alongside colleagues to scrutinise markets and firm behaviour. Your work will include:

• Drive the economic analysis on complex competition projects. This will involve scoping problems that require investigation, including market failures that may be causing poor outcomes for consumers, developing and overseeing analytical plans and developing quality assurance of analysis to ensure delivery of robust outputs
• Supporting the Manager in driving the activity of team. This might include allocating tasks and workstreams, supporting and developing more junior colleagues, and planning project delivery
• Providing expert economic advice to both senior colleagues and delivering support and leadership to more junior colleagues
• Supporting, line and/or work-managing colleagues
• Driving the delivery of high quality economic and competition findings, including quantitative economic data, which will be used to make evidence-based recommendations
• Influencing and developing the team and department’s strategy, helping to define priority outcomes and measures of success, using your judgement to advance the FCA’s goals, and presenting on behalf of the team

What will you get from the role?

As part of the team, you will get to investigate whether and why financial services markets might not be working well for consumers. You will also help propose economically sound remedies for how financial services markets could be improved.

The work will allow you to apply your economic skills to real problems in financial service markets. You will be asked to scope hypotheses and produce high quality economic analysis to test your hypotheses.

You will contribute to setting priorities, planning and driving the delivery of/contribution to complex and high-profile projects.

Which skills are required?

We are a Disability Confident Employer; therefore, disabled people or individuals with long-term conditions who best meet the minimum criteria for a role will go through to the next stage of the recruitment process. (To learn more about the Disability Confident Scheme Click Here)

Minimum

• Previous experience of working as an economist at a regulator, government department, consultancy, industry or academia
• An academic background in economics, including a qualification in Economics at least at undergraduate level
• Experience of working with data sets, and performing statistical reviews using software packages such as R, Stata, Python

Essential

• Experience driving, scoping and delivering relevant economic work, making judgements and presenting key issues and recommendations to senior stakeholders
• Strong management capability (e.g., project management) to help plan, prioritise and allocate work within the team
• Ability to review complex information on markets and firm behaviour to form analysis
• Previous experience with or exposure to competition economics
• Ability to work collaboratively and effectively as part of a multi-disciplinary team
• An interest in working with economic data sets to produce accurate and thorough findings
• Excellent drafting and oral communication skills
• Experience with and understanding of the economics that underpins competition policy. Candidates will be tested on this at interview

Our Values & Diversity

We are proud to be an inclusive employer and our ambition is to cultivate a culture for all employees that respects their individual strengths, views, and experiences. We believe that our differences and similarities enable us to be a better organisation – one that makes better decisions, drives innovation, and delivers better regulation.

Within the workplace you will have access to various employee resource groups which aim to promote and achieve a healthy work/life balance and support our diversity ambitions.

Did you know? 50% of our Executive Committee were the first in their family to attend university.

The FCA is committed to achieving greater diversity across all levels of the organisation. Given this, we particularly welcome applications from women, minority ethnic, disabled, and neurodivergent candidates for our technical specialist role.

Benefits of working at the FCA

• 28 days holiday per year plus bank holidays
• Hybrid working (work from home up to 60% of your time)
• Private healthcare with Bupa
• A non-contributory Pension of at least 8%
• Life assurance
• Income protection

We also have a competitive flexible benefits scheme which gives you the opportunity to create a personalised benefits package, tailored to suit your lifestyle.

We welcome applications from candidates who are looking for flexible arrangements. Many of our staff work flexibly including working part-time, staggered hours, and job shares. We can’t promise to give you exactly what you want but we can explore what might work best for both sides. Follow this link to see what life is like at the FCA - Life at the FCA

Application Support

We are dedicated to removing barriers and ensuring our application process is accessible to everyone. We offer a range of adjustments to make your application experience as comfortable and straightforward as possible.

If you have an accessibility need, disability, or condition requiring changes to the recruitment process, please contact your recruiter using the details below and they will be happy to discuss this further with you.

Useful Information and Timeline

• This role is graded as: Technical Specialist - Regulatory
• Advert Closing Date: 9th March
• Technical Interview: 20th & 21st March
• Competency Interview: 27th & 28th March

Your Recruiter will discuss the process in detail with you during screening for the role, therefore, please make them aware if you are going to be unavailable for any date during this time.

Got a question?

If you are interested in learning more about the role, please contact:

• For external applicants, please contact Chhavi Bartaria at Chhavi.bartaria@fca.org.uk
• For internal applicants, please contact Lucy Matthews at Lucy.matthews@fca.org.uk

Applications must be submitted through our online portal. Applications sent via email will not be accepted.