Abhijit Banerjee, the Indian-origin professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been awarded the 2019 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences along with Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer. An announcement on Monday said the three economists had been awarded “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty”.
“This year’s Laureates have introduced a new approach to obtaining reliable answers about the best ways to fight global poverty. It divides this issue into smaller, more manageable questions – for example, the most effective interventions for improving child health,” the announcement said.
Here are the five things to know about Abhijit Banerjee
• Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee studied at the University of Calcutta, Jawaharlal Nehru University and Harvard University. He wrote his doctoral thesis on ‘Essays in Information Economics’ and received his Ph.D in 1988.
• Abhijit Banerjee is the Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
• Abhijit Banerjee founded the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), along with Esther Duflo and Sendhil Mullainathan in 2003.
• Abhijit Banerjee is the author of four books including Poor Economics (with Esther Duflo) that has won the Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year.
• He has also co-directed two documentary films: ‘The Magnificent Journey: Times and Tales of Democracy (co-directed with Ranu Ghosh) in 2019 and ‘The Name of the Disease’ in 2006.
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