2020 Nobel in Economics is awarded to Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson

The Nobel Prize 2020 in Economic Sciences on Monday was awarded to Paul R. Milgrom and Robert B. Wilson “for improvements to auction theory and inventions of new auction formats.”

“This year’s Laureates, Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson, have studied how auctions work. They have also used their insights to design new auction formats for goods and services that are difficult to sell in a traditional way, such as radio frequencies,” The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said in a press release.

“Their discoveries have benefitted sellers, buyers and taxpayers around the world,” it added.

The award caps a week of Nobel Prizes and is technically known as the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel. Since its establishment in 1969, it has been awarded 51 times and is now widely considered one of the Nobel prizes.

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Besides prestige, the prize comes with a 10-million krona ($1.1 million) cash award and a gold medal to be handed out at a ceremony in Oslo, Norway, on December 10, the anniversary of prize founder Alfred Nobel’s death.

In 2019, the award was shared by Indian-American economist Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer. The trio was awarded for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty.

Other Nobel winners this year

·         The Nobel prize for physiology and medicine went to two Americans and a British scientist for their contribution in identifying the Hepatitis C virus, which causes cirrhosis and liver cancer.

·         On Thursday, the Nobel prize for literature was given to American poet Louise Gluck for her “candid and uncompromising” work.

·         The Nobel Peace Prize 2020 was awarded to the World Food Programme (WFP) for its efforts to combat hunger and food insecurity around the globe.

·         Half of the Nobel Prize in Physics, announced on Tuesday in Sweden, was awarded to Roger Penrose for showing how black holes could form, and the other half went to Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez for discovering a supermassive object at the Milky Way’s center.

·         The Nobel prize in Chemistry was awarded on Wednesday to two women scientists – Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer A. Doudna – who developed the Crispr tool, which can change the DNA of animals, plants and microorganisms with high precision.