Pedro Portugal studied economics at the Universidade do Porto and received his PhD at University of South Carolina; in 1991.
He is currently a senior researcher at the Bank of Portugal and invited professor of economics at Nova School of Business and Economics. His main area of interest is applied labor economics; focusing on issues of microeconomics of unemployment; unemployment compensation; wage bargaining; job security; and worker displacement. Pedro Portugal has published in the major economics and labor economics journals, including the American Economic Review, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of the European Economic Association, American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, Economic Policy, Economica, Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Labor Economics, Journal of Human Resources, Labour Economics and Industrial and Labor Relations Review. He has also published in other fields, namely, in Industrial Economics and Strategic Management: including the Journal of Industrial Economics, International Journal of Industrial Organization, Small Business Economics and Strategic Management Journal.