Exclusive access to Nobel Prize judges in economics: Winners use 200 years of data to study the female job market

Tencent News "Periscope" Ji Zhenyu October 9 from Silicon Valley

The 2023 Nobel Prize in Economics was announced on October 9, Sweden local time, and this year the prize was awarded to Claudia Goldin, an American economist and Harvard professor, in recognition of her research contributions in the field of women's labor market.

At the press conference announcing the prize, the Nobel Prize Committee in Economics said that this year's laureate's research in the field of economics revealed key drivers of gender differences in the labor market.

"Understanding the role of women in the workforce is important to society. Thanks to Claudia Golding's groundbreaking research, we now have a better understanding of the underlying factors and obstacles that may need to be addressed in the future. Chairman Jacob Svensson said at the press conference.

The Committee is of the view that women are grossly underrepresented in the global labour market and that when they work, they earn less than men. Claudia Golding's collection of relevant data on the United States over the past 200 years has enabled her to show how gender income and employment differences have changed over time.

Her research shows that women's participation in the labour market has not continued to rise over the entire period, but has formed a U-shaped curve. During the transition from an agrarian to an industrial society in the early 19th century, married women's labor force participation declined, but with the development of the service sector in the early 20th century, participation began to increase. Claudia Golding explains this model as the result of structural changes and the evolution of social norms regarding women's responsibilities towards the family and family.

In the 20th century, women's education levels continued to rise, and in most high-income countries, women are now much more educated than men. Claudia Golding proved that the spread of contraceptives has played an important role in accelerating this revolutionary change, providing new opportunities for career planning.

Despite modernization, economic growth and the increase in the proportion of women employed in the twentieth century, the income gap between women and men has barely narrowed for a long time.

According to Claudia Golding's research, this is partly because educational decisions affect a person's career opportunities, and these decisions are made at a relatively young age. If young women's expectations are formed based on the experience of previous generations — for example, their mothers, who don't return to work until their children grow up — development will be slow.

Historically, a large part of the income gap can be explained by differences in education and career choices. Claudia Golding argues that much of this income gap now is between women and men in the same industry, and it largely arises with the birth of the first child.

Tencent News "Periscope" immediately after the announcement of the Nobel Prize in Economics connected with Christofer Edling, a member of the Nobel Prize committee and professor of sociology at Lund University in Sweden, and the following is the transcript of the conversation:

Awards are a long process, perhaps years

Tencent News "Periscope": First of all, can you give us a brief introduction to yourself?

Christofer Edling: I am a member of the award committee of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and in everyday life I am a professor of sociology at Lund University in southern Sweden.

Tencent News "Periscope": Okay, can you also talk about your role in the award committee?

Christofer Edling: The prize work is to some extent a collective work of the committee. This year's committee consists of 11 members with diverse backgrounds and broad definitions of expertise in the economic sciences.

That's why I became one of the commissioners, even though I'm a sociologist. We have economic historians, we have statisticians. So this is mostly economics, but it also touches on the fringes of economics a little. Since none of us are experts in every field, based on the nominations we received, we received commissioned reports from experts in different fields, then read those reports, discuss them, dig deeper into some details and so on, until we came to the conclusion that it was a very worthwhile area. So, when we set out to try to develop an award in this particular area, we work on many of these award proposals in parallel every year, which is a long process, and it usually takes many years for an award to get to where we are today.

Tencent News "Periscope": Yes. So can you talk about this year's winner, Professor Claudia Golden? Her research area is the women's labour market. Can you talk about why the Committee considers her work very important?

Christofer Edling: I think there are two aspects to this award. One is substantive and has to do with the benefits of the award to society. This is an interesting question about labour market participation and the differences between men and women. From an economic point of view, it was necessary to ask whether the low participation rate of women caused the labour market to lose some capacity. So whether we're getting a fundamental mismatch between the resources we have (i.e., the people we can hire) and the economic outcomes. So does this mean that our society is not making full use of its resources?

Then there is a more academic interest. It is a prize that rewards an interesting combination of economic history that collects data over a long period of time and finds data in previously unknown sources, compiles long-term trajectories of change, and combines them with economic explanations to provide explanatory models for patterns manifested in the data. So it's a combination of economic history and economics. I think this is probably the most exciting aspect of the prize for academics.

Tencent News "Periscope": Can you also share with us how this work has affected you personally as a committee member?

Christofer Edling: I personally get inspiration from the different methods and different data Claudia Golding uses. She identified a problem and wanted to understand and explain it. Then she used every tool in the toolbox, including archival data, experimental setup, survey data. I especially find the richness of this approach and methodology very enlightening. Not just collecting data, but also trying to explain these patterns.

We try to avoid world politics and focus on academic contributions

Tencent News "Periscope": Regarding last year's economics prize, three economists won the prize for their research on bank crises, such as bank runs and monetary policy. It is very interesting that the banking crisis in March this year did occur in the United States. We have seen some small and mid-sized banks fail, such as Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic Bank. In addition, Credit Suisse, one of Europe's largest banks, went bankrupt and was acquired by UBS. So in a way, last year's economics prize seemed to show some predictive power. Do you think this is just a coincidence, or did the committee really consider some very practical and pressing issues in the process of selecting the winners, which led to some later events?

Christofer Edling: Actually, I don't think the prize has that predictor. But I agree with you, it sounds almost too coincidental, last year's award for the banking crisis, and what happened afterward. But we should also remember that last year's awards were mostly about events much older, the financial crisis of the '30s and 2000s. But on the other hand, when you deal with the social sciences, it's hard to escape that research is conducted in the society we live in. The Committee is part of society. So, of course, this correspondence will come up from time to time. This year's award also addresses topics of social concern, not only from the point of view of equality, but also in terms of supply and demand in the labour market.

Tencent News: Is the Nobel Prize Committee more interested in certain areas of economics research at these annual meetings?

Christofer Edling: I can't actually answer what we're doing. Of course, guessing next year's prize is an interesting game for economists. We work on the basis of nominations, and we send out invitations to nominations for awards to many researchers around the world.

These nominations form the basis of our research. If we don't have any nominations, we can't move forward with an award. In this sense, I believe that the selection of the prize currently being discussed by the Committee will reflect the development of global economics.

Tencent News Periscope: So did the committee face any challenges or complexities in the process of selecting the winners each year?

Christofer Edling: No, because we're really trying to avoid current affairs, trying to avoid world politics, and focus on academic contributions. Therefore, we look rigorously at whether the research results are so important that it changes our understanding and drives the development of the field. In this sense, our lives become somewhat very simple, and we are strictly focused on academic contributions.

Tencent News "Periscope": So the committee is not affected by the current economic world development?

Christofer Edling: No, really. As you said, it sounds a little strange, but on the other hand, I think economics does. The work done by economists and economic science research pays a lot of attention to current affairs and current changes, but the prize is usually awarded for contributions from several years ago, and to some extent, it can be said that the committee's award proposals always lag slightly behind current developments. That's the way it is. We need time to evaluate the contribution.

Tencent News "Periscope": How long have you been on the committee?

Christofer Edling: 5 years.

Tencent News "Periscope": Based on your observations, what changes and developments have occurred in the committee or awards over the years?

Christofer Edling: I would say that the procedure, organization and way of doing things are the same every year. In this sense, there is a long-established pattern for this work, and we adhere to this model. The only external influence we have had is the nomination and the reports of the experts we commission. That's basically all the information we use. So, it's a very closed environment with little change.