Nobel Prize in Economics goes to prosperity researcher from the USA
Published: Monday, Oct 14th 2024, 15:00
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Why are some countries poor and others rich? This question plays a central role in the research of economists Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson and James Robinson. They have now been awarded the Nobel Prize for their work.
Three economists working in the USA have been awarded this year's Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for their research into the wealth gap between nations. The prestigious award goes to Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson and James A. Robinson, as announced by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm.
The three award winners had demonstrated how important social institutions are for the prosperity of a country through their research into the development of political and economic systems in the colonial era, the academy praised. Societies with a weak rule of law and exploitative institutions generated neither economic growth nor change for the better.
While the introduction of institutions characterized by co-determination benefits everyone in the long term, exploitative institutions only bring short-term benefits for those in power, the academy explained. The research by Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson helps to better understand the background to this.
"Reducing the huge income disparities between countries is one of the greatest challenges of our time," said Jakob Svensson, President of the relevant prize committee. Thanks to the award winners' groundbreaking findings, a much deeper understanding of the root causes of why some countries succeed and others fail has been developed.
"Real shock and great news"
Acemoglu, who was born in Turkey, and Johnson, who comes from the UK, are professors at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), while Robinson, also a professor with British roots, is at the University of Chicago. All three are also US citizens, where they have lived for some time.
Acemoglu had previously been considered a favorite for this year's Nobel Prize by several economists - but he was still surprised by his award. "This is simply a real shock and great news. Thank you!" said the 57-year-old when he was connected to the award ceremony in Stockholm.
Laureates in the USA are often woken up by the time difference when the Nobel Institutions phone them shortly before the official announcement that they have been awarded a Nobel Prize. Acemoglu was lucky in this respect: he was not at home in the USA, but in Greece.
"It's a really good coincidence that I'm in Athens right now. So it's not 5.00 in the morning for me," he said. That also made it easier to take in the news of his Nobel Prize.
Linking democracy and growth
Praise for the selection of the Nobel Prize winners came from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, among others. "The award is highly deserved and fits perfectly into the current times," explained the President of the Institute, Moritz Schularick.
With their research, Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson have shown, among other things, how closely democracy and growth are linked. "Their work also makes it clear how much populism harms Europe and the world economically when it damages democratic institutions, often permanently," says Schularick.
The research is also relevant for Switzerland, says Hans Gersbach, Director of the KOF Swiss Economic Institute at ETH Zurich. "For Switzerland, the Nobel Prize winners indirectly show how important our economic and political institutions - and their further development - are for the country's economic future," he says.
All Nobel Prize winners of this year selected
The announcement of the prize in the economics category traditionally marks the end of the annual Nobel Prize announcements, after all the other winners were chosen last week. While the awards in the medicine, physics and chemistry categories were all given to male researchers from North America and Great Britain this time, the Nobel Prizes for Literature and Peace went to Asia: this year, the South Korean writer Han Kang and the Japanese anti-nuclear weapons organization Nihon Hidankyo were awarded the prizes.
In contrast to these five categories, the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences is not based on the will of dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel (1833-1896). It has been endowed by the Swedish central bank since the end of the 1960s.
Nevertheless, like the other prizes, it will be presented at a ceremony on the anniversary of Nobel's death on December 10 and is also associated with the same prize money as the other awards - this year it is eleven million Swedish kronor (just under 908,000 Swiss francs) per category.
Last year, US economist Claudia Goldin was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics. The professor at the elite Harvard University was honored for her research on the role of women in the labor market. After Elinor Ostrom in 2009 and Esther Duflo in 2019, Goldin was only the third woman among the more than 90 Nobel Prize winners in economics to date.
©Keystone/SDA
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