Abhijit Banerjee

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee
Banerjee in November 2011
Born
Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee

(1961-02-21) 21 February 1961 (age 63)
Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
CitizenshipAmerican
Spouse
Arundhati Tuli Banerjee
​
​
(div. 2014)​
Randomized controlled trials
Awards
Information at IDEAS / RePEc
Academic background
ThesisEssays on Information Economics (1988)

Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee (pronounced

MIT based global research center promoting the use of scientific evidence to inform poverty alleviation strategies.[5][6] In 2019, Banerjee shared the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences with Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer, "for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty."[1][6] He and Esther Duflo are married, and became the sixth married couple to jointly win a Nobel or Nobel Memorial Prize.[7]

In addition to his academic appointments, Banerjee is a fellow of the Econometric Society,[4] a member of the National Academy of Sciences,[3] and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[4] In 1994, he received a Sloan Research Fellowship,[4] awarded annually to early career researchers with the "potential to revolutionize their fields." According to Research Papers in Economics, Banerjee is among the most productive development economists in the world, ranking in the top 75 researchers by total research output.[8]

Early life and education

Banerjee was born to a

PhD from the London School of Economics under the supervision of Richard Lipsey.[1] His mother, Nirmala (née Patankar) Banerjee was a professor at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta.[1]

Banerjee attended secondary school at

Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata.[1] He dropped out of the program after one week, transferring to Presidency College, then an affiliate of the University of Calcutta
, to study economics.

Banerjee spent three years at

BSc (Honors) in Economics in 1981.[2] He took classes with his father, Dipak Banerjee, in addition to Mihir Rakshit.[1] His favorite subject was economic history, taught by Nabhendu Sen.[1]

After completing his undergraduate studies, Banerjee pursued an

PhD programs in economics.[1]

Banerjee applied to Harvard, Stanford, and the University of California, Berkeley, attending the first of these despite no students from Jawaharlal Nehru University having previously been admitted to the university.[1] At Harvard, his classmates included Tyler Cowen, Alan Krueger, Steven Kaplan, and Nouriel Roubini.[1] He attended courses with Andreu Mas-Colell, Lawrence Summers, Kala Krishna, Oliver Hart, and Susan Collins, and briefly served as a research assistant to Jeffrey Sachs.[1] His dissertation research, supervised by Eric Maskin, was primarily theoretical, and examined the economics of information.[1]

Academic career

Banerjee is currently the Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology;

Alfred P. Sloan Fellow.[3]

His work focuses on

field experiments as an important methodology to discover causal relationships in economics.[16]
He was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2004.[17] In 2009, he received the Infosys Prize in the social sciences (economics) category.[18] He served on the Social Sciences jury for the Infosys Prize in 2018. In 2012, he shared the Gerald Loeb Award Honorable Mention for Business Book with co-author Esther Duflo for their book Poor Economics.[19]

In 2013, he was named by the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to a panel of experts tasked with updating the Millennium Development Goals after 2015 (their expiration date).[20]

In 2014, he received the Bernhard-Harms-Prize from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.[21]

In 2019, he delivered Export-Import Bank of India's 34th Commencement Day Annual Lecture on Redesigning Social Policy.[22]

In 2019, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics, together with Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer, "for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty".[23]

Research and work in India

Banerjee and his co-workers try to measure the effectiveness of actions (such as government programmes) in improving people's lives. For this, they use

polio vaccination is freely available in India, many mothers were not bringing their children for the vaccination drives. Banerjee and Prof. Esther Duflo, also from MIT, tried an experiment in Rajasthan, where they gave a bag of pulses to mothers who vaccinated their children. Soon, the immunization rate went up in the region. In another experiment, they found that learning outcomes improved in schools that were provided with teaching assistants to help students with special needs.[25]

Banerjee is a co-founder of Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (along with economists Esther Duflo and Sendhil Mullainathan).[26] In India he serves on the academic advisory board of Plaksha University, a science and technology university established in 2010.[27][28]

Personal life

Abhijit Banerjee was married to Dr. Arundhati Tuli Banerjee, a lecturer of literature at MIT.[29][30] Abhijit and Arundhati had one son together and later divorced.[29] Their son, born in 1991, died in an accident in 2016.[31]

In 2015, Banerjee married his co-researcher, MIT professor Esther Duflo; they have two children.[32][33] Banerjee was a joint supervisor of Duflo's PhD in economics at MIT in 1999.[32][34] Duflo is also a professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics at MIT.[35]

Publications

Scholia has a profile for Abhijit Banerjee (Q320578).

Books

  • ISBN 9780199248612
    .
  • Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak;
    ISBN 9780195305203
    .
  • Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak (2005). Making Aid Work. Cambridge:
    ISBN 9780262026154
    .
  • Banerjee, Abhijit V.; Duflo, Esther (2011).
    ISBN 9781610390408
    .
  • Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak; Duflo, Esther, eds. (2017). Handbook of Field Experiments, Volume 1.
    ISBN 9780444633248
    .
  • Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak; Duflo, Esther, eds. (2017). Handbook of Field Experiments, Volume 2.
    ISBN 9780444640116
    .
  • Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak ( 2019 ). A Short History of Poverty Measurements. Juggernaut Books.
  • Banerjee, Abhijit V.; Duflo, Esther (2019).
    ISBN 9781541762879
    .

Awards

Abhijit Banerjee was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 2019 along with his two co-researchers Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer "for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty".[36]

The press release from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences noted: "Their experimental research methods now entirely dominate development economics."[37][38]

The Nobel committee commented:

"Banerjee, Duflo and their co-authors concluded that students appeared to learn nothing from additional days at school. Neither did spending on textbooks seem to boost learning, even though the schools in Kenya lacked many essential inputs. Moreover, in the Indian context Banerjee and Duflo intended to study, many children appeared to learn little: in results from field tests in the city of Vadodara fewer than one in five third-grade students could correctly answer first-grade curriculum math test questions.[38]
"In response to such findings, Banerjee, Duflo and co-authors argued that efforts to get more children into school must be complemented by reforms to improve school quality."[38]

The Nobel Prize was a major recognition for their chosen field - Development Economics, and for the use of Randomised Controlled Trials. It evoked mixed emotions in India, where his success was celebrated with nationalistic fervour while his approach and pro-poor focus were seen as a negation of India's current government's right-wing ideology as well as broader development discourse.[39]

Banerjee's achievement of the Nobel Prize was received with a cold shoulder by the

Hindu person, over other Hindu academicians who adhered to Hindu norms of hierarchy.[41]

He was awarded the

Honoris Causa) by the University of Calcutta in January 2020.[42]

Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement in September 2022.[43]

See also

  • Amartya Sen, economist and the first Indian to receive a Nobel prize in the field

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o "The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2019". NobelPrize.org. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  2. ^ a b "Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee CV" (PDF). Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  3. ^ a b c "Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee Economics Department MIT". Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 14 October 2019. Retrieved 14 October 2019.
  4. ^ a b c d "Abhijit Banerjee". International Growth Centre. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  5. ^ "J-PAL Co-Founders Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo Awarded Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics". The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL). 15 October 2019. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  6. ^ a b Smialek, Jeanna (14 October 2019). "Nobel Economics Prize Goes to Pioneers in Reducing Poverty". The New York Times. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  7. ^ "Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo is the 6th couple to win a Nobel Prize". India Today. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  8. ^ "Economist Rankings | IDEAS/RePEc". ideas.repec.org. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  9. ^ "3 Bengalis won the Nobel. Abhijit Banerjee first to wear dhoti". India Today. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  10. ^ "Most Indian Nobel winners Brahmins: Gujarat Speaker Rajendra Trivedi". The Indian Express. 4 January 2020. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  11. ^ "'Abhijit was a quiet boy from class of 1976 at South Point'". www.telegraphindia.com. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  12. ^ "When Nobel Laureate Abhijit Banerjee spent 10 days in Tihar jail". India Today. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  13. ^ "Banerjee's JNU arrest and 12 days in Tihar jail". www.telegraphindia.com. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  14. ^ "Abhijit Banerjee – Short Bio". economics.mit.edu. Retrieved 15 October 2019.
  15. ^ "MIT economists Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee win Nobel Prize". MIT News. Retrieved 15 October 2019.
  16. doi:10.3386/w14467
    . Retrieved 15 October 2019.
  17. ^ "Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter B" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 17 May 2011.
  18. ^ "Infosys Prize 2009 – Social Sciences – Economics". Archived from the original on 17 May 2011. Retrieved 14 October 2019.
  19. ^ "UCLA Anderson Announces 2012 Gerald Loeb Award Winners". UCLA Anderson School of Management. 26 June 2012. Archived from the original on 12 April 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  20. ^ "Ban names high-level panel to map out 'bold' vision for future global development efforts". 31 July 2012. Retrieved 6 November 2013.
  21. ^ "Bernhard Harms Prize 2014". ifw-kiel.de. Retrieved 15 October 2019.
  22. ^ "Make govt jobs less cushy: MIT economist Abhijit Banerjee on 10% quota". Business Standard. 9 January 2019. Retrieved 14 October 2019.
  23. ^ Bandiera, Oriana (21 October 2019). "Alleviating poverty with experimental research: The 2019 Nobel laureates". VoxEU. CEPR. Retrieved 13 April 2023.
  24. S2CID 210377958
    . Retrieved 16 October 2019. To bring some science to the fight against poverty, the three researchers borrowed a key tool from clinical medicine: the randomized controlled trial. [They] have used trials to test interventions in education, health, agriculture, and access to credit.
  25. ^ "Economics of poverty: On Economic Sciences' Nobel". The Hindu. Retrieved 21 October 2019.
  26. ^ "Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer win 2019 Nobel Economics Prize". The Times of India. 14 October 2019. Retrieved 15 October 2019.
  27. ^ "Plaksha University". plaksha.org. Retrieved 14 October 2019.
  28. ^ Bhagarva, Anjuli (21 March 2022). "Plaksha University aims to challenge IITs, reimagines engineering education". Business Standard. New Delhi, India. Retrieved 23 May 2022. The upcoming Plaksha University reimagines engineering education and prepares students for a digitally powered future.
  29. ^ a b "Malcolm Adiseshiah Award 2001, A Profile: Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee" (PDF). Malcolm & Elizabeth Adiseshiah Trust & Madras Institute of Development Studies (MIDS). 2001. Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 July 2017. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  30. ^ "Global Studies and Languages, Biography: Arundhati Tuli Banerjee". MIT. 18 August 2018. Archived from the original on 18 August 2018. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  31. ^ "AB positive - The Week". www.theweek.in. Retrieved 13 May 2024.
  32. ^ a b Gapper, John (16 March 2012). "Lunch with the FT: Esther Duflo". Financial Times. Archived from the original on 5 November 2018. Retrieved 28 April 2019.
  33. ^ "Esther's baby". Project Syndicate. 23 March 2012. Archived from the original on 27 November 2015. Retrieved 28 April 2019.
  34. ^ "Our focus is to enrol people suffering from lack of identity: Nandan Nilekani". The Times of India. 6 July 2010.
  35. ^ "Esther Duflo CV". Esther Duflo at MIT. 2018. Archived from the original on 9 August 2018. Retrieved 27 April 2019.
  36. ^ Johnson, Simon; Pollard, Niklas (14 October 2019). "Trio wins economics Nobel for science-based poverty fight". Reuters.
  37. ^ "The Prize in Economic Sciences 2019" (PDF). Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences: Nobel prize. 14 October 2019. Retrieved 14 October 2019.
  38. ^ a b c "Nobel Prize in Economics won by Banerjee, Duflo and Kremer for fighting poverty". The Guardian. 14 October 2019.
  39. ^ "The Discontents of a Nobel Prize". The Wire. Retrieved 1 September 2020.
  40. ^ "Piyush Goyal: Nobel Winner Abhijit Banerjee 'Totally Left Leaning, Indians Rejected His Thinking'". The Wire.
  41. ^ "Is Foreign Wife Criterion for Nobel Prize? After Goyal, BJP's Rahul Sinha Mocks Abhijit Banerjee". www.news18.com.
  42. ^ Calcutta University Awards Doctor Of Letters Degree To Abhijit Banerjee
  43. American Academy of Achievement
    .

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Abhijit_Banerjee&oldid=1223613465"