Because economics is such a diverse field, with many distinguished thinkers, predicting the winner of the Nobel Prize in economics is notoriously difficult. But suppose that we narrowed the field, so as to focus on candidates who have not only made important theoretical contributions, but have also had a significant impact on the world, and affected the lives of numerous people?
If that is the standard, here are some leading contenders for the prize, which is to be announced today:
Esther Duflo, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Governments are keenly interested in the actual effects of their interventions, but they often lack tools to establish what works and what doesn't. Building on work in medicine and related fields, Duflo has pioneered the use of randomized controlled trials. One group of people serve as a control; another group, otherwise identical, is subjected to a policy intervention, designed to reduce disease, increase access to loans, reduce poverty or improve education. If the trials are done properly, they can be used isolate the actual effects of the intervention. That's huge progress.
In recent work, Duflo argues that an economist can be a plumber: “She installs the machine in the real world, carefully watches what happens, and then tinkers as needed.” Focusing on poverty and development, Duflo’s own randomized controlled trials are not only providing invaluable information to policy makers; they are also getting help to many people who need it.
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Read more:
Should Arabian Gulf countries worry about remittances?
Inter-cultural ties are key building blocks for international business
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Richard Posner, University of Chicago. Recently retired from the federal bench, Posner is the leading thinker behind the field of law and economics, which tries to analyse legal rules with the help of economic tools.
Suppose that a local government imposes a rent control law, or that a state court strikes down certain contracts as “unconscionable” because they are unfair to poor people. What are the likely effects? Whether the issue involves occupational safety, automobile accidents, antitrust law, consumer protection or the role of private property, public officials, lawyers and judges are now using the methods that Posner helped introduce. (If Posner gets the Nobel, a strong co-recipient would be Judge Guido Calabresi, who also did pioneering work.)
William Nordhaus, Yale University. The problem of climate change raises unusually difficult problems for economists, not least because of high levels of uncertainty about the likely effects, tough questions about how to turn those effects into monetary equivalents, and serious challenges, at the intersection of economics and philosophy, about how to deal with harm to future generations. More than anyone else, Nordhaus has produced disciplined, rigorous and luminously clear thinking about all of these questions, in a way that is transparent about underlying assumptions and that makes real progress on, and possibly even solves, some seemingly intractable problems.
Nordhaus’s work played a defining role in the efforts of the U.S. to produce a “social cost of carbon,” which in turn influenced many regulatory initiatives both here and abroad. (If Nordhaus gets the Nobel, a strong co-recipient would be Harvard’s Martin Weitzman, who has done pioneering work on how to think about risks of catastrophe, with special reference to climate change.)
W. Kip Viscusi, Vanderbilt University. Viscusi is rarely listed among Nobel candidates, but his work on the monetary valuation of risks to life and health has had a massive effect. In the U.S. alone, it plays a major role in the work of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Transportation, the Department of Energy, the Department of Labor and the Department of Health and Human Services.
These agencies and many others build on Viscusi’s work on the “value of a statistical life.” Viscusi does not really ask what a life is worth; he is interested in the value of statistical risks. If, for example, workers face a mortality risk of 1 in 100,000, how much compensation do they get in return? Suppose that the best answer is in the vicinity of $90. With a little multiplication, that produces a $9 million value for a statistical life -- roughly Viscusi’s own figure, which is, not coincidentally, the value now used by most agencies of the U.S. government.
Richard H. Thaler, University of Chicago. Over recent decades, the rise of behavioural economics has been the most interesting development in economic theory. More than anyone else, Thaler has been responsible for that development.
He has shown that in concrete ways, people do not act as predicted by standard economic theory. Far from seeing money as fungible, people put their cash in separate “mental accounts” (mortgage money, vacation money, retirement money). Investors overreact to unexpected news events. Human beings care about fairness -- and they are willing to pay something to punish people who have been unfair. People are planners as well as doers, and when they are planning, they might try to foil their own doing (as, for example, by keeping high-calorie foods out of the house).
It’s true that with respect to Thaler, I’m biased. He’s a friend as well as a co-author. But no one can doubt that his influence can be seen in the work of governments all over the world, as officials use his findings to increase retirement savings, cut poverty, boost employment, increase safety on the highways and improve health. (Thaler is the pioneer, but worthy co-recipients would be Colin Camerer of the California Institute of Technology, Ernst Fehr of the University of Zurich, George Loewenstein of Carnegie Mellon University and Matthew Rabin of Harvard.)
Economics is called “the dismal science,” and since the Great Recession, the field has taken a beating in the public eye. Sure, some of the research of those listed here has produced dismal news -- but it has also helped make the world a much better place.
Cass R. Sunstein is a Bloomberg View columnist. He is the author of “#Republic: Divided Democracy in the Age of Social Media” and a co-author of “Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness.”
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A MINECRAFT MOVIE
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Jason Momoa
Rating: 3/5
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
Abramovich London
A Kensington Palace Gardens house with 15 bedrooms is valued at more than £150 million.
A three-storey penthouse at Chelsea Waterfront bought for £22 million.
Steel company Evraz drops more than 10 per cent in trading after UK officials said it was potentially supplying the Russian military.
Sale of Chelsea Football Club is now impossible.
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
if you go
The flights
Etihad, Emirates and Singapore Airlines fly direct from the UAE to Singapore from Dh2,265 return including taxes. The flight takes about 7 hours.
The hotel
Rooms at the M Social Singapore cost from SG $179 (Dh488) per night including taxes.
The tour
Makan Makan Walking group tours costs from SG $90 (Dh245) per person for about three hours. Tailor-made tours can be arranged. For details go to www.woknstroll.com.sg
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COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
The National's picks
4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
5.45pm: Raging Torrent
6.20pm: West Acre
7pm: Flood Zone
7.40pm: Straight No Chaser
8.15pm: Romantic Warrior
8.50pm: Calandogan
9.30pm: Forever Young
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
The specs
Engine: 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo
Power: 398hp from 5,250rpm
Torque: 580Nm at 1,900-4,800rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed auto
Fuel economy, combined: 6.5L/100km
On sale: December
Price: From Dh330,000 (estimate)
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Fixtures
50-over match
UAE v Lancashire, starts at 10am
Champion County match
MCC v Surrey, four-day match, starting on Sunday, March 24, play starts at 10am
Both matches are at ICC Academy, Dubai Sports City. Admission is free.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
From exhibitions to the battlefield
In 2016, the Shaded Dome was awarded with the 'De Vernufteling' people's choice award, an annual prize by the Dutch Association of Consulting Engineers and the Royal Netherlands Society of Engineers for the most innovative project by a Dutch engineering firm.
It was assigned by the Dutch Ministry of Defence to modify the Shaded Dome to make it suitable for ballistic protection. Royal HaskoningDHV, one of the companies which designed the dome, is an independent international engineering and project management consultancy, leading the way in sustainable development and innovation.
It is driving positive change through innovation and technology, helping use resources more efficiently.
It aims to minimise the impact on the environment by leading by example in its projects in sustainable development and innovation, to become part of the solution to a more sustainable society now and into the future.
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
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THE SPECS
Engine: 1.5-litre
Transmission: 6-speed automatic
Power: 110 horsepower
Torque: 147Nm
Price: From Dh59,700
On sale: now
Baby Driver
Director: Edgar Wright
Starring: Ansel Elgort, Kevin Spacey, Jamie Foxx, Lily James
Three and a half stars
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
Email sent to Uber team from chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi
From: Dara
To: Team@
Date: March 25, 2019 at 11:45pm PT
Subj: Accelerating in the Middle East
Five years ago, Uber launched in the Middle East. It was the start of an incredible journey, with millions of riders and drivers finding new ways to move and work in a dynamic region that’s become so important to Uber. Now Pakistan is one of our fastest-growing markets in the world, women are driving with Uber across Saudi Arabia, and we chose Cairo to launch our first Uber Bus product late last year.
Today we are taking the next step in this journey—well, it’s more like a leap, and a big one: in a few minutes, we’ll announce that we’ve agreed to acquire Careem. Importantly, we intend to operate Careem independently, under the leadership of co-founder and current CEO Mudassir Sheikha. I’ve gotten to know both co-founders, Mudassir and Magnus Olsson, and what they have built is truly extraordinary. They are first-class entrepreneurs who share our platform vision and, like us, have launched a wide range of products—from digital payments to food delivery—to serve consumers.
I expect many of you will ask how we arrived at this structure, meaning allowing Careem to maintain an independent brand and operate separately. After careful consideration, we decided that this framework has the advantage of letting us build new products and try new ideas across not one, but two, strong brands, with strong operators within each. Over time, by integrating parts of our networks, we can operate more efficiently, achieve even lower wait times, expand new products like high-capacity vehicles and payments, and quicken the already remarkable pace of innovation in the region.
This acquisition is subject to regulatory approval in various countries, which we don’t expect before Q1 2020. Until then, nothing changes. And since both companies will continue to largely operate separately after the acquisition, very little will change in either teams’ day-to-day operations post-close. Today’s news is a testament to the incredible business our team has worked so hard to build.
It’s a great day for the Middle East, for the region’s thriving tech sector, for Careem, and for Uber.
Uber on,
Dara
Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
