Hubert Fromlet Stockholm / Kalmar/ Växjö, October 5, 2020
Affiliate professor (affilierad professor) of International Economics at Linnaeus University (LNU/Linnéuniversitetet), Kalmar and Växjö / Sweden
hubert.fromlet@gmail.com - tel /phone + 46 70 768 4992 Contact? Preferably by gmail/phone or SMS
Prize in Economics in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2020 – my own favorite candidates
Riksbankens Ekonomipris till Alfred Nobels minne 2020 – mina personliga favoriter
It is hard to predict the winner(s) of the Nobel Prize in Economics (formally:”The Riksbank’s Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel”). There use to be around 250 serious candidates. In the past 19 years, I predicted 22 out of totally 38 winners (58%), mainly by checking out the research areas the award primarily should go to and then by trying to find the most deserving researchers in those areas.
Like in 2018 and 2019, I do not mainly focus on the most probable forecasts for the leading candidates but concentrate this year again on summing up a number of economists who would deserve the award according my own preferences in 2020 – and there are certainly more interesting names also outside the lists below. Further courageous prize decisions should be possible – when it comes to gender and age but
also to ethnical and geographical background.
My preferred five main female candidates are now, after having taken away last year’s co-winner Esther Duflo (no ranking): Susan Athey (Stanford), Marianne Bertrand (Chicago), Janet Currie
(Princeton), Claudia Goldin (Harvard), and Anne Krueger (Johns Hopkins University).
I also use my old list of now 31 candidates from originally 40 in 2017 - a list that still should have a probability of 10-15 percent to include this year’s winner(s). 4 new names compared to 2019 are added, replacing two economists who got the prize last year and two professors who passed away in 2020.
Another updated list of candidates gathers names which I since 2017 define as “courageous choices”.
Research areas that should be focused in 2020 are according to my own preference (without ranking):
¤ labor markets(including inequality and discrimination)
¤ education on all levels (primary and secondary schools included)
¤ banking and financial markets(micro, not so much monetary policy)
¤ politics, law, environment, sociology, gender issues and particularly health – with links to economics
¤ important statistical tests and econometrics (preferably applicable for practitioners).
My main personal favorites in 2020 (not probability): I plead again for female laureates – particularly for Susan Athey, Marianne Bertrand, Janet Currie and Claudia Goldin – and for Daron Acemoglu, Joshua
Angrist, Jaghdish Bhagwati, Robert Barro, Richard Blundell and Kevin Murphy as male prize winners.
My female favorites for the “Nobel Prize” in Economic Sciences in 2020 - with a minor revision from 2019 Egna favoriter bland kvinnliga kandidater till
ekonomipriset år 2020 - lätt reviderad lista från 2019
Athey, Susan (Stanford)* Economics of technology; now more than a great talent Bertrand, Marianne (Chicago) Labor and gender economics, inequality; “data finder”
Case, Anne (Princeton) Health economics
Currie, Janet (Princeton) Labor and family economics, prize with O. Mitchell?
Finkelstein, Amy (MIT)* Health economics, public finance
Goldin, Claudia (Harvard) Gender issues on labor markets/in education; pioneer Hall, Bronwyn (Berkeley) Technology, innovations, patents, institutions
Krueger, Anne O. (Johns Hopkins) International trade /development; pioneer “rent seeking”
Mitchell, Olivia S. (Wharton) Economics of households /pioneer “financial literacy”
Ng, Serena (Columbia) Econometrics, big data O’Hara, Maureen (Cornell) Market microstructure
Reinhart, Carmen (Harvard) Financial history and markets (but used poor statistics) Romer, Christina (Berkeley) Fiscal policy, monetary shocks
Stokey, Nancy (Chicago) Economic development and growth
*Previous winners of the very prestigious John Bates Clark Medal - historically given to many future Nobel laureates.
It should be possible to make the list above – including just one female economist born in Europe (Bertrand) – easily somewhat longer which probably will become more obvious some years from now. Also in this current list, one can find more probable and less probable names. My own female five top favorites can be seen on page 1. The objective of the table above is to show that there remains a reasonable number of female Nobel Prize candidates for the near future also after the selection of Esther Duflo.
We should also note that mixed combinations could be possible. In 2019, I particularly pointed at Esther Duflo / Abhijit Banerjee (both MIT) and Partha Dasgupta (Cambridge) – but then Michael Kremer (Harvard) turned out to be the third award winner. This year, I refrain from special preferences for the mixed list below and suggest the following combinations in the first group (without ranking):
¤ Marianne Bertrand (Chicago) / Joshua Angrist (MIT) / Richard Blundell (UC London)
¤ Janet Currie (Princeton) / Jonathan Gruber (MIT) / Sendhil Mullainathan (Chicago)
¤ Olivia Mitchell (Wharton) / Claudia Goldin (Harvard) / Edward Lazear (Stanford)
¤ Anne Krueger (Johns Hopkins) / William Easterley (NYU) / Jaghdish Baghwati (Columbia)
Female economists remain underrepresented
Kvinnliga forskare fortfarande klart underrepresenterade
One year ago, I wrote the following lines in my paper about the potential winners of the
“Nobel Prize”:
“Laureates in economics of today usually had their major scientific achievements in the 1980s or early 1990s, i.e. at a time when female scientific research still was a rare phenomenon compared to male scientific research. This fact usually serves as the main explanation or excuse for the still ongoing, completely insufficient number of female Nobel laureates (just two, Elinor Ostrom in 2009 and Esther Duflo last year). It may be added that that the famous John Bates Clark medal to outstanding economists under 40 years so far only had four female prize winners (currently two of them on my list of female candidates after having canceled Esther Duflo).
If one strictly looks at the - unofficial - criterion of a significant scientific breakthrough as long as 20-30 years back in time, almost half of my own list of female candidates would disappear. This is why I have been pleading for a less “formal” selection process when it is obvious that certain relatively young economists - such as Susan Athey or Marianne Bertrand – already can pass a demanding evaluation of their research after a (somewhat) shorter application and testing period than 20-30 years. It felt good that this principle of a long waiting time – which I had been questioning to some extent in the past few years - was relaxed in 2019 when Esther Duflo was selected as a co-winner.
Some hope comes from the fact that the very low female participation on all Nobel Prize lists – not only in economics – now starts to become a serious issue for discussion.
So far, the female contribution to all Nobel Prizes is just 3 percent. Indeed embarrassing!
It is often argued that female economic research can give wider and more varying perspectives. I have no special view on that. So far, I have not found any research that really illuminates the topic more profoundly. However, we will certainly see a
development in the future with more female laureates, probably more visibly 5-10 years from now. Sustained efforts will be needed to firmly increase the frequency of
successful female economic research. It will not happen automatically. Quite a number of institutional and mental improvements will be necessary.
However, I have a clear impression that the different Swedish Nobel Prize Committees now seriously consider different ways to speed up the process of gradually finding more female candidates and prize winners.
10 courageous name choices (7 names left from 2017) –
but why are they still courageous?
10 ”modiga” namnbeslut - men varför behöver de vara modiga överhuvudtaget?
¤ Acemoglu, Daron - may be still considered as too young (but he is getting “older” as well),
¤ Barro, Robert* - often characterized as not specialized enough, lagging strong emphasis
¤ Currie, Janet* - (child) health care and wellbeing - receiving too little focus from economists
¤ Baghwati, Jaghdish - may be regarded as too practical and too little theoretical
¤ Dasgupta, Partha - sometimes confronted with the same wrong argument as Bhagwati
¤ Eichengreen, Barry - great (historical) international understanding but rarely on lists before
¤ Granovetter, Mark - sociological research often seen too far away from economics (wrong)
¤ Jorgenson, Dale* - has been waiting for a long time, still a pioneer in productivity research
¤ Murphy, Kevin - seen as a big talent for many years (now too mature for still being a talent)
¤ de Soto, Hernando - said having insufficient affinity to the world of theory and models
*New names
I would be glad to see anyone in this group as this year’s winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics (last year, Esther Duflo was on this list; Assar Lindbeck unfortunately passed away in the meanwhile, regrettably without having won the prize).
Looking at the lately actualized list, all names deserve to win.
Addendum: If possible including a female (co-)winner!
My own list of preferred ”top 40 Nobel candidates” for 2020* /
no forecast; initially prepared in 2017 - but nine new names since 2017**
Min egen preferenslista för 2020 års pris med totalt 40 namn* /
ej prognoser, 2017 års förslagslista som bas – nio nya namn sedan 2017**
Top-40 list with my own favorites Top 40-lista med egna favoriter
Research areas
Forskningsområden (bland andra)
Acemoglu, Daron (MIT) Ekonomisk historia, tillväxt, politisk ekonomi, institutioner Aghion, Philippe (Harvard University) Tillväxt- och kontraktsteori
Angrist, Joshua (MIT) Arbetsmarknad, utbildning Athey, Susan (Stanford)** Teknologi och ekonomi
Barro, Robert (Harvard University) Tillväxt, humankapital, penningpolitik, konjunktur Bertrand, Marianne (Chicago)* Arbetsmarknad, etnisk och könsrelaterad diskriminering, Bhagwati, Jagdish (Columbia University) Frihandel, globalisering, “emerging markets”
Blanchard, Olivier (MIT, Peterson) Monopolistisk konkurrens (imperfekt konkurrens), ojämlikhet Blundell, Richard (LSE) Arbetsmarknad, politisk ekonomi, (tillämpad) ekonometri Card, David (Berkeley) Arbetsmarknad, ”economics of immigration”, ojämlikhet Currie, Janet (Princeton)* (Child) health care, wellbeing
Dasgupta, Partha (Cambridge) Utvecklingsekonomi, ”emerging markets”, miljö, kost /näring Diamond, Douglas W. (Chicago) Bank och finans, finanskriser, likviditet
Dixit, Avinash (Princeton) Organisation, investeringsbeslut under osäkerhet, utrikeshandel Easterley, William (NYU)** Utvecklingsekonomi
Eichengreen, Barry (Berkeley) Internationell ekonomi, ekonomisk historia Fuller, Wayne (ISU) / Dickey, David (NCSU) Statistik, ”Dickey-Fuller Test”
Granovetter, Mark (Stanford) Sociala nätverk i ekonomin
Grossman, Gene (Princeton) Internationell handel och tillväxt, ”political economy”
Goldin, Claudia (Chicago)** Arbetsmarknad, teknologi, utvecklingsekonomi Hall, Robert (Stanford)** Makro, konjunktur, privat konsumtion
Hausman, Jerry (MIT) Mikroekonomiska metoder och applikationer, ”Hausman Test”
Helpman, Elhanan (Harvard) Internationell handel, tillväxt, politisk ekonomi Imbens, Guido (Stanford)** Ekonometri, statistik, kausalitet
Jensen, Michael (Harvard)* Finansmarknader, ”corporate finance”
Jorgenson, Dale (Harvard) Tillväxt, produktivitet, IT, miljö, länken ekonomi och statistik Kiyotaki, Nobuhiro (Princeton) “Links macro/micro, economic shock model, imperfect credits”
Kreps, David (Stanford) Dynamiska beslutssituationer/-processer, beteende vid beslut Lazear, Edward (Stanford) Arbetsmarknad, ”personnel economics”
Krueger, Anne (Johns Hopkins) Internationell handel, ”rent seeking”, ”emerging markets”
Lerner, Josh (Harvard) “Entrepreneurial management and finance”, innovationer Manski, Charles (Nestern) Socialpolitik, ”social interaction”, ekonometri, prognosteknik Milgrom, Paul (Stanford) Kontrakts-, auktionsteori, “corporative games”, prissättning Mullainathan, Sendhal (Chicago)* Arbetsmarknad, beteende, IT
Murphy, Kevin (Chicago) Humankapital, tillväxt, hälsa, ojämlikhet Phillips, Peter (Yale, Southhampton) Ekonometri, statistik, tidsserier
Rubinstein, Ariel (Tel Aviv Univ, NYU) Spelteori, ”bargaining” (with impatience), ”bounded rationality”
Shell, Karl (Cornell) Tillväxt (endogen), penningteori, ”generational modeling”
Shleifer, Andrei (Harvard) ”Corporate finance”, “transition economies”, finanspsykologi Stokey, Nancy (Chicago) Tillväxt, ekonomisk utveckling, ”no-trade theorem”
* New names in 2020. **Among five names that have been replacing previous names in 2018/2019 //.
Ovanstående uppställning är från 2017. Borttagna är nio priskandidater efter 2017 – de senare prisvinnarna Paul Romer, William Nordhaus, Esther Duflo och Abhijit Banerjee samt fem under tiden bortgångna forskare. Nio nya namn har tillkommit de senaste tre åren, markerade för 2018/2019 med ** och för 2020 med *.
Summary / Slutsatser
A. Conclusions
¤ This report is written for also continuously supporting an increasing number of female Nobel laureates. The current situation is still poor. However, there are sufficient female candidates for a female prize winner or co-winner in economics in 2020 as well.
¤ Obviously, the problem has been identified by the Prize Committee for Economics as well. But more action is needed. Some further recommendations for finding female prize winners are given also in this year’s paper. Altogether, the future should look brighter in the medium and longer run.
¤ The awarded research areas I would prefer the in 2020 are:
- labor markets and education on all levels - health economics (including the environment)
- technology and economics - the advantages of free trade
- certain statistical tests and econometrics for practitioners.
¤ My 10 top prize candidates are –
female: Janet Currie, Claudia Goldin, Marianne Bertrand and Susan Athey;
male: Daron Acemoglu, Joshua Angrist, Robert Barro, Jaghdish Bhagwati, Richard Blundell, Kevin Murphy.
B.
Slutsatser
¤ Mer långsiktigt kommer situationen för kvinnliga prisvinnare av allt döma att ljusna.
Men vad betyder ”mer långsiktigt” i detta sammanhang? Fem till tio år? Förhoppningsvis (något) mindre än så! Redan för 2020 kan jag se 3-4 riktigt värdiga kvinnliga pristagare.
¤ Min prioriteringar för prisbelönade forskningsområden år för 2020:
- arbetsmarknad och utbildning på alla nivåer
- hälsa och ekonomi (inkl miljö) - teknologi och ekonomi
- fördelarna med frihandel - statistiska testmetoder och praktiskt orienterad ekonometri
¤ 10 namn som jag personligen skulle vilja se i den främsta kandidatraden för 2020 – kvinnor: Susan Athey, Marianne Bertrand, Janet Currie och Claudia Goldin;
män: Daron Acemoglu, Joshua Angrist, Robert Barro, Jaghdish Bhagwati, Richard
Blundell och Kevin Murphy.
Hubert Fromlet
Affilierad (affiliate) professor
