Foundations of Behavioral and Experimental Economics: Daniel Kahneman and Vernon Smith

Advanced information on the Prize in Economic Sciences 2002. Until recently, economics was widely regarded as a non-experimental science that had to rely on observation of real-world economies rather than controlled laboratory experiments. Many commentators also found restrictive the common assumption of a homo oeconomicus motivated by self-interest and capable of making rational decisions. But research in economics has taken off in new directions. A large and growing body of scientific work is now devoted to the empirical testing and modification of traditional postulates in economics, in particular those of unbounded rationality, pure self-interest, and complete self-control. Moreover, today's research increasingly relies on new data from laboratory experiments rather than on more traditional field data, that is, data obtained from observations of real economies. This recent research has its roots in two distinct, but converging, traditions: theoretical and empirical studies of human decision-making in cognitive psychology, and tests of predictions from economic theory by way of laboratory experiments. Today, behavioral economics and experimental economics are among the most active fields in economics, as measured by publications in major journals, new doctoral dissertations, seminars, workshops and conferences. This year's laureates are pioneers of these two fields of research.behavioral economics; experimental economics

Paul Krugman: Trade and Geography - Economies of Scale, Differentiated Products and Transport Costs

Scientific Background, The Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences 2008. Over the centuries, international trade and the location of economic activity have been at the forefront of economic thought. Even today, free trade, globalization, and urbanization remain as commonplace topics in the popular debate as well as in scholarly analyses. Traditionally, trade theory and economic geography evolved as separate subfields of economics. More recently, however, they have converged become more and more united through new theoretical insights, which emphasize that the same basic forces simultaneously determine specialization across countries for a given international distribution of factors of production (trade theory) and the long-run location of those factors across countries (economic geography).Trade; Geography;

Robert Aumann and Thomas Schelling: Conflict and cooperation through the lens of game theory

The Prize in Economic Sciences 2005: supplementary information to press release. Robert Aumann and Thomas Schelling have contributed to enhancing our understanding of conflict and cooperation. They have achieved this by extending and applying game theory â a method used to analyze strategic interaction among different agents. Their work has transformed the social sciences far beyond the boundaries of economics. AumannâÂÂs and SchellingâÂÂs research continues to shape the debate on the formation of social institutions.Game Theory; Conflict; Cooperation

George A. Akerlof, A. Michael Spence, Joseph E. Stiglitz: Markets with Asymmetric Information

Akerlof, Spence and Stiglitz's analyses form the core of modern information economics. Their work transformed the way economists think about the functioning of markets. The analytical methods they suggested have been applied to explain many social and economic institutions, especially different types of contracts. Other researchers have used and extended their original models to analyze organizations and institutions, as well as macroeconomic issues, such as monetary and employment policy.Asymmetric information;

Paul Krugman: International Trade and Economic Geography

Information for the Public. This year's Laureate is awarded the Prize for his research on international trade and economic geography. By having shown the effects of economies of scale on trade patterns and on the location of economic activity, his ideas have given rise to an extensive reorientation of the research on these issues.Trade; Geography

Elinor Ostrom and Oliver Williamson: Economic governance: the organization of cooperation

Traditionally, economic theory has by and large been a theory of markets or, more precisely, about market prices. However, there are at least two reasons why economic science should extend beyond price theory. First, markets do not function properly unless suitable contracts can be formulated and enforced. Hence, we need to understand the institutions that support markets. Second, considerable economic activity takes place outside of markets – within households, firms, associations, agencies, and other organizations. Hence, we need theories to explain why these entities exist and how they work.Economic Governance;

Time-series Econometrics: Cointegration and Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity

Advanced information on the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, 2003. Empirical research in macroeconomics as well as in financial economics is largely based on time series. Ever since Economics Laureate Trygve Haavelmo's work it has been standard to view economic time series as realizations of stochastic processes. This approach allows the model builder to use statistical inference in constructing and testing equations that characterize relationships between economic variables. This year's Prize rewards two contributions that have deepened our understanding of two central properties of many economic time series - nonstationarity and time-varying volatility - and have led to a large number of applicationstime-series; cointegration

Peter A. Diamond, Dale T. Mortensen and Christopher A. Pissarides: Markets with Search Frictions

Scientific Background on the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2009 compiled by the Economic Sciences Prize Committee of the Royal Swedish Academy of SciencesSearch frictions;

Thomas J. Sargent and Christopher A Sims: The art of distinguishing between cause and effect in the macroeconomy

How are GDP and inflation affected by a temporary increase in the interest rate or a tax cut? What happens if a central bank makes a permanent change in its inflation target or a government modifies its objective for budgetary balance? This year’s Laureates in economic sciences, Thomas J. Sargent and Christopher A. Sims, have developed methods for answering these and many other questions regarding the causal relationship between economic policy and different macroeconomic variables such as GDP, inflation, employment and investments.Causation; macroeconomics