Two Massachusetts Institute of Technology economists were awarded the Nobel Prize in economics on Monday for their decades of research unraveling the relationship between political institutions and economic prosperity.
A statement from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said: “Societies with insufficient rule of law and systems that exploit their citizens will not lead to growth or change for the better.” “Our study of the winners helps us understand why.”
The 2024 Swedish National Prize in Economics in Memory of Alfred Nobel was awarded to three co-investigators: MIT Economics Professors Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson, and Professor James Robinson of the University of Chicago.
The award recognizes the work of researchers who have examined hundreds of years of countries’ history to demonstrate how democracy, which upholds the rule of law and individual and property rights, fosters economic growth. This is what I did.
“The fundamental finding we’ve made in our research so far is that you can certainly get episodes of growth under a variety of different arrangements,” Johnson said at an MIT press conference Monday morning. spoke. The more we can move towards such inclusive participation, the stronger and more solid we will become. ”
Acemoglu said inclusive economic institutions include “secure property rights” and “education, public infrastructure, appropriate regulation” and other measures that maintain equal opportunity. He pointed out that inclusive political systems are designed with a framework in which people’s voice and power are decentralized and “not monopolized by one group, one individual, or one political party.”
In the Nobel Prize announcement, this research examines the various countries colonized by Europeans and the changes in their institutions, and comprehensively examines the changes in the countries that exploited indigenous peoples and extracted resources, as well as for the benefit of European immigrants. He explained in detail that he researched countries that had formed strong political and economic systems.
“Making democracy work is a difficult task, but countries that become democratic generally grow faster and grow in the right way: they grow in a more equal way and invest more in education and health care. “It will be,” Acemoglu said. “So both political inclusion and economic inclusion are important, and they have a synergistic effect.”
Economists spoke on Monday about how they heard the news, with Mr Acemoglu saying he heard it on the balcony of his hotel room in Athens, and Mr Johnson sending a text message that “actually doesn’t seem inappropriate for 2024”. He recalled receiving the.
Acemoglu described it as a “great day” and the culmination of a “long journey” that began with the topic that first made him interested in economics.
“Reducing the huge income differences between countries is one of the greatest challenges of our time,” said Jacob Svensson, chairman of the Committee for the Prize in Economic Sciences. “The winners have demonstrated the importance of social institutions in achieving this.”
