PIIE congratulates former colleague Simon Johnson for Nobel Prize in Economics

The Peterson Institute for International Economics is delighted and proud to congratulate Simon Johnson, former senior fellow at the Institute, for being awarded the 2024 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in memory of Alfred Nobel, jointly with Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson, "for studies of how institutions are formed and affect prosperity." Johnson was previously a visiting fellow at PIIE from 2006 to 2007 and a senior fellow from 2008 to 2019.

Johnson's early work that won the Nobel prize was conducted at the Massachusetts Institute for Technology (MIT) in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but he refined and pursued those same themes in the decades that followed, including while he was writing about and debating the Global Financial Crisis, developments in the euro area, banking reform, and other current events with PIIE colleagues. His work at PIIE can be found here.

"Support and ideas from colleagues during my time at PIIE were really helpful in the process of convincing others to take our research findings seriously," Johnson said this week. "I was incredibly lucky to spend time at PIIE. I learned a huge amount from colleagues, and the hallways were always full of insight and information. The Friday staff lunch sessions were the most incisive policy discussions I have ever attended. Thanks to everyone at PIIE for their hard work and clarity of thought."

Adam S. Posen, president of the Peterson Institute, said: "Simon's combination of fearlessness, creativity, and collegiality is truly special. We are fortunate to have had the benefit of his contributions published, but also shared informally, as a member of the PIIE community, which are ongoing. We are so proud of his receipt of the Nobel Prize, and we look forward to celebrating him when he gives a distinguished lecture at the Peterson Institute early in 2025."

Johnson is currently the Ronald A. Kurtz (1954) Professor of Entrepreneurship at the MIT Sloan School of Management, where he is head of the Global Economics and Management group. At MIT, he is also codirector of the Shaping the Future of Work Initiative and a research affiliate at Blueprint Labs. In 2007–08, Johnson was chief economist and director of the research department at the International Monetary Fund. He currently co-chairs the CFA Institute Systemic Risk Council with Erkki Liikanen. In February 2021, Johnson joined the board of directors of Fannie Mae, where he is vice chair of the audit committee and a member of the risk and capital committee. He is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and a fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR).

Johnson's most recent book, with Daron Acemoglu, Power and Progress: Our 1000-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity, explores the history and economics of major technological transformations up to and including the latest developments in artificial intelligence. Power and Progress is currently scheduled for publication in about 20 languages around the world. It was longlisted for the 2023 Financial Times and Schroders Book of the Year and for the Baillie Gifford Prize for nonfiction, and it was shortlisted for the 2024 Lionel Gelber Prize. His previous book, with Jonathan Gruber, Jump-Starting America: How Breakthrough Science Can Revive Economic Growth and the American Dream, explains how to create millions of good new jobs around the United States, through renewed public investment in research and development. This proposal attracted bipartisan support, as reflected in the 2022 Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act.

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