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STORY: :: Three U.S.-based academics win the Nobel prize for economics for exploring why global inequality persists

:: October 14, 2024

:: Stockholm, Sweden

:: Jakob Svensson, Committee chair, Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences

“This is about understanding global inequality which is in terms of measurement largely explained by differences in income across countries. So in a broad sense it's about understanding why some countries are rich and why some countries are poor and the laureates have identified in particular the institutions both economic and political as one of the core driving factors.”

Simon Johnson and James Robinson, both British-American, and Turkish-American Daron Acemoglu were commended for their work by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said.

"Reducing the vast differences in income between countries is one of our time's greatest challenges. The laureates have demonstrated the importance of societal institutions for achieving this," said Jakob Svensson, Chair of the Committee for the Prize in Economic Sciences.

The award came a day after World Bank report showed that the world's 26 poorest countries - home to 40% of its most poverty-stricken people - are more in debt than at any time since 2006, highlighting a major reversal in the fight against poverty.

Acemoglu told the Nobel press conference that data gathered by pro-democracy groups showed that public institutions and rule of law in many parts of the world were being weakened.

"I think this is a time when democracies are going through a rough patch," Acemoglu said. "And it is in some sense quite crucial that they reclaim the high ground of better governance, cleaner governance, and delivering sort of the promise of democracy to a broad range of people."

Acemoglu and Johnson work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, while Robinson is at the University of Chicago.

The prestigious award, formally known as the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, is the final prize to be given out this year and is worth 11 million Swedish crowns ($1.1 million).