The Nobel Prize in Economics for Claudia Goldin. She is only the third woman to receive this award

Unlike the peace, chemistry, physiology, medicine and literature prizes awarded since 1901, Alfred Nobel did not establish a distinction in economics in his will. Its founder has been the Bank of Sweden since 1969. Hence the official name is: Bank of Sweden Award. Alfred Nobel. The winner is selected by a group of economics professors from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

Nobel Prize in Economics for Claudia Goldin

In 2023, Claudia Goldin received her degree in Economics. This year’s award was granted for contributions to research on women in the labor market. Goldin was the first to comprehensively examine the issue of women’s earnings and labor market outcomes over the centuries. The results of her work revealed new conclusions on this topic and set the direction for changes.

Goldin also showed what are the most important reasons for the existence of the wage gap. Historically, the difference in earnings between men and women can be explained by differences in the choice of education and profession. However, Goldin showed that most of the wage gap now exists between men and women who work in the same profession. The wage gap appears when the first child is born.

Claudia Goldin raises in her works, among others, the issue of the so-called greedy work. This is a job in which the pay rate increases with the employee’s availability to the employer. In contrast, there is flexible work, where the rate increases linearly because “work organization/technology makes it possible to find a replacement person. Therefore, there is no ‘reward’ for greater availability (for employees who agree to it) or ‘ “penalties in the form of, for example, lack of promotion for unavailability,” economist Marek Skawiński explained on X (former Twitter) in 2022.

“How can there be differences in earnings between women and men? At the beginning of a professional career, M and F wages are very similar, and large differences appear around the age of 32-48, when people have a family, and with it comes limitation in the parent’s availability to the employer. The following model is often chosen: one of the parties chooses a flexible and lower-paid job, allowing them to combine work with home duties, while the other party decides on a ‘greedy job’ to increase the total family income compared to ‘ flexible’ work. In this sense, the overall choice of partners is ‘rational’, but for cultural reasons, men are statistically more likely to have ‘greedy’ jobs. Does such a choice mean a permanent difference in wages also in the future? It depends on the organization of work,” he explains. Skawiński.

Winners in the field of economic sciences receive – just like scientists from other fields – the award from the King of Sweden at a joint ceremony on December 10, on the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death.

The Nobel Prize in Economics was awarded to only two women out of 92 laureates

The 92 Economics Nobel laureates have so far included two women – the American Elinor Ostrom (died in 2012), awarded in 2009, and the French-American economist Esther Duflo, awarded in 2019, who was also the youngest person honored with the prestigious distinction – she was then 46 years. The oldest winner is 90-year-old Leonid Hurwicz.

There are no Poles among the economists awarded the Nobel Prize so far, although a Polish accent appeared in 2007. The above-mentioned American economist of Polish-Jewish origin, Professor Leonid Hurwicz (died in 2008), was honored for his work on the theory implementing mathematical systems into processes.