Claudia Goldin wins Nobel Prize in Economics

Yesterday it was announced that Claudia Goldin won the 2023 Nobel Prize in Economics (formerly the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel). She is the 3rd woman to have won the economics Nobel. The Nobel press release summarizes her research as follows: Women are vastly underrepresented in the global labour…

mRNA vaccine pioneers win the Nobel Prize

The 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine went to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman. The prizewinner’s work lead to the development of COVID-19 vaccines which averted millions of deaths worldwide. The Nobel Prize press release describes the scientific breakthrough in more detail: Karikó and Weissman noticed that dendritic cells recognize in vitro transcribed mRNA as a…

2022 Nobel Prize in Economics Goes to…

Ben Bernanke, Douglas Diamond and Philip Dybvig. The award was given for the laureates role in improving our understanding of the role of banks in the economy, particularly during financial crises. The Nobel website summarizes their contribution as follows: For the economy to function, savings must be channelled to investments. However, there is a conflict…

2021 Nobel Prize in Economics goes to Card, Angrist and Imbens

The 2021 Nobel Prize in Economics goes to David Card, Joshua Angrist and Guido Imbens due to their work on “natural experiments” and how this econometric technique can inform important research questions in labor economics. From the Nobel Prize press release: Using natural experiments, David Card has analysed the labour market effects of minimum wages, immigration and…

Nobel Prize in Medicine

David Julius and Ardem Patapoutian have won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their work “for their discoveries of receptors for temperature and touch.” Here is a summary of Professor Julius’ contribution from the BBC: Prof David Julius’s breakthrough, at the University of California, San Francisco, came from investigating the burning pain…

The 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics goes to…

…Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer. The announcement on the 2019 Economics award on the Nobel website: This year’s Laureates have introduced a new approach to obtaining reliable answers about the best ways to fight global poverty. In brief, it involves dividing this issue into smaller, more manageable, questions – for example, the most effective interventions for…

2018 Economics Nobel goes to Nordhaus and Romer

 The Nobel Prize in Economics (formally the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel) was awarded to William Nordhaus and Paul Romer.  For Romer, the Nobel Prize committee cited his work on endogenous growth theory, that models “how economic decisions and market conditions determine the creation of new technologies. Paul Romer solved…

HWR is up

Hank Stern of InsureBlog hosts this week’s “Pink edition” Health Wonk Review. Check it out. Also of note this week is that Richard Thaler has the 2017 Nobel prize in economics.  For more on Dr. Thaler’s work, check out the Nobel Prize website.