‘Nudge’ economist Richard Thaler wins Nobel Prize
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US economist Richard Thaler, one of the founding fathers of behavioural economics, has won this year’s Nobel Prize for Economics.
Prof Thaler, of the University of Chicago Booth, co-wrote the global best seller Nudge, which looks at how people make bad choices.
It spawned “nudge theory” of how to help people make better life decisions.
The Nobel prize panel said his work had contributed to an understanding of the psychology of economics.
Prof Thaler will receive 9 million Swedish krona (£850,000) from the committee.
“I will try to spend it as irrationally as possible!” the 72 year-old economist said.
One of the judges, Per Stroemberg of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, said his work had explored how specific aspects of human psychology shape economic decisions.
“Richard Thaler’s findings have inspired many other researchers coming in his footsteps and it has paved the way for a new field in economics which we call behavioural economics,” Mr Stroemberg said.
