Proving that nobody knows anything, the Nobel prize for economics is awarded this year to Robert Engle and Clive Granger.
I didn’t think they had it in them. The New York Times editorialises in favour of a Cubs-Red Sox World Series, consigning their home team Yankees to the dust. Keep those fingers crossed.
Two reasonably informed commentators reckon Paul Krugman has a decent shot at this year’s Nobel prize in economics, perhaps together with Jagdish Bhagwati.
The truth, of course, is that the Nobel committees remain the last bastion of leak-proof deliberations. So, to steal a line from William Goldman, nobody knows anything. That being the case, I’ll add my tuppence worth. By all accounts, Krugman’s work in international trade is Nobel-worthy.
But the Nobel committees (peace prize excepted) have a general history of avoiding political controversy, and staying safely academic. On that reading, Krugman’s high public profile since he took on his New York Times gig might come close to disqualifying him from consideration.
So intense, however, is the European distaste for the Bush administration that I could envision the Nobel being awarded to Krugman precisely because it would — indirectly — be a slap in the face of the adminstration. It would be a neat way to recognise clearly sterling academic work and to make a timely political point.
Anyway, we should know the answer in the next hour or so.
How could a magazine as clued up as MIT’s Technology Review start a weblog without permalinks or RSS? I can only hope that they remedy the faults quickly, as writers like Rodney Brooks are always worth reading.