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Kiel Institute Honors Young Economists and Journalists

Global Economy Prize Empfänger 2019

The winners of the Kiel Institute Excellence Awards in Global Economic Affairs 2019 are:

  •  Xavier Jaravel (London School of Economics) for his contributions to the field of Innovation and Inequality. Jaravel´s findings include evidence that product innovations do not benefit all households equally, but rather disproportionately benefit high income households. In another contribution Jaravel shows that policies that increase exposure to innovation may have greater potential to spur innovation than traditional policies such as reducing tax rates.
  • Joseph Shapiro (University of California at Berkeley) for his contributions to the field of Environment and Trade. In one recent research project Shapiro identifies and documents an environmental bias of trade policy – the implicit subsidy to CO2 emissions in internationally traded products.  Shapiro shows that reducing this bias would contribute to lower global CO2 emissions without hurting global income.  
  • Alexander Wolitzky (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) for his contributions to the field of Social Learning, Public Policy and Institutions.  Wolitzky´s key findings include a general rationale for the scarcity of cost-saving innovations; and the rule under which capital taxation is progressive or U-shaped under political constraints.

Each of the three winners will be awarded a Research Fellowship at the Kiel Institute funded through separate scholarship programs (Horst Siebert Fellowship, Porsche Fellowship, and Landeshauptstadt Kiel Fellowship). As Research Fellows, the young economists will receive content-related and organizational support from a number of prominent researchers as well as the opportunity to participate in research projects at the Kiel Institute. The aim of the Kiel Institute’s Excellence Awards in Global Economic Affairs is to build an international community of young economic researchers. The Excellence Awards have been presented annually since 2007.

The Theodor-Wille-Heinrich-Diedrichsen Journalismuspreis Fair Trade carries a prize money of 1200 Euros and goes to Pascale Müller and Stefania Prandi for their extensive research and the influential media contributions that resulted from it on sexualised violence and coercion among harvest workers in Mediterranean agriculture.

The three-member jury was particularly impressed by the work of the prizewinners, who put themselves in real danger for their months of investigative research about the abuse of harvest workers in Italy, Spain and Morocco. With courage, tenacity and empathy, the authors managed to overcome resistance and win the trust of women who have no lobby. Their publication, which was published by Correctiv and Buzzfeed in German, English and Spanish, has also had a great impact and, in addition to much post-reporting, has also led to public debates, demonstrations, discussions and reflections at buyers and sellers.

The award-winning entries (in German):

The Theodor Wille e.V. (TW e.V.), in cooperation with the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, awards a prize of Euro 1200 every two years for outstanding journalistic achievement in German on the subject of fair trade.

The award ceremony took place on June 22, 2019 as part of the program of the Global Economy Prize.