Nobel Economics Prize American Scholar Duo 'Milgrom·Wilson' Who Invented "Frequency Auctions"

USA, White, Male... Typical Economics Award Winner
Inventor of "Spectrum Auction"... "Deriving Benefits for the Entire Society"

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Moon Jiwon] Paul Milgrom (72) and Robert Wilson (83), Professor Emeritus at Stanford University in the United States, who jointly won this year's Nobel Prize in Economics, are auction theory experts famous for inventing the 'frequency auction method.'

On the 12th (local time), the Nobel Committee of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced that Professor Milgrom and Professor Emeritus Wilson were selected as the recipients of the 2020 Nobel Prize in Economics.

According to Stanford University's website, Professor Milgrom was born in 1948 in Detroit, USA, and received his Ph.D. in Business Administration from Stanford University in 1979. After working at Northwestern University and Yale University, he has been nurturing students at his alma mater since 1987. He is currently a professor in the humanities department.

Professor Emeritus Wilson has conducted research on game theory and its application to economics and business. He was born in 1937 in Nebraska and earned his doctorate from Harvard University. He taught students at Stanford University from 1964 and is currently an emeritus professor.

The simultaneous ascending auction method devised by the two scholars is currently used not only for frequency but also for auctioning electricity, natural gas, and more. It is famous as the 'frequency auction.'

When auctioning public goods such as frequencies, existing market principles may not apply, so they invented a method that limits bidders who can obtain frequency licenses but awards the license to the highest bidder when multiple competitors participate.

They utilized a simultaneous ascending auction method that repeats bidding until only one company remains. As the auction price rises, the item is sold at the highest price, and the government can use the proceeds for taxpayers' benefit.

The United States first introduced their auction theory in 1994 and conducted wireless frequency auctions targeting telecommunications operators, and other countries subsequently followed and applied this theory.

Professors Milgrom and Wilson received the Nobel Prize in Economics about 26 years after designing the new auction method. The Nobel Prize in Economics is usually awarded only when the theory has been empirically validated in various ways, so recipients tend to be relatively older.

The committee explained, "Milgrom and Wilson introduced a new auction method through a theoretical approach and contributed to maximizing benefits for buyers and sellers, taxpayers and users, and society as a whole."

The two scholars are relatively typical Nobel Prize in Economics recipients. So far, the Nobel Prize in Economics has mainly been awarded to white American male scholars. The average age of recipients was 65. Except for age, this formula mostly held true this time as well.

Last year, three people?Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo, and Michael Kremer?were awarded for their experimental approach to solving international poverty issues.

According to CNN, among the 931 individual Nobel laureates (28 institutions) in history, women barely exceed 6% (57 people), and Black individuals are less than 2% (16 people). This year, there were four female laureates in Physics, Chemistry (joint award), and Literature, but diversity is still considered insufficient.

This year's Nobel Prizes concluded with the Economics Prize. There were no Asian recipients, including Koreans.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.