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United States Richard Thaler is a Nobel Prize-winning economist whose work on behavioral economics has redefined understanding of human economic decision-making.
Richard Thaler is the founder of Fuller & Thaler Asset Management, an asset management firm that capitalizes on cognitive biases in investor behavior such as the endowment effect, loss aversion, and status quo bias.
Thaler co-founded and served as the co-director of the Behavioral Economics Project at the National Bureau of Economic Research from 1991 to 2015.
Thaler was involved in the establishment of the Behavioural Insights Team, which was originally part of the British Government's Cabinet Office and later became a limited company, aiming to improve social policies through 'nudges'.
Thaler has written a series of economic solutions for America's financial challenges as a columnist for The New York Times News Service, including proposing selling parts of the radio spectrum to pare the US deficit.
Richard H. Thaler was born on September 12, 1945, in East Orange, New Jersey. He pursued his higher education at Case Western Reserve University, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1967. Subsequently, he received his Master of Arts in 1970 and his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1974 from the University of Rochester. His doctoral thesis, titled “The Value of Saving a Life: A Market Estimate,” was supervised by Sherwin Rosen. After completing his studies, Thaler began his academic career as a professor at the University of Rochester. Thaler’s early academic journey also included a significant period at Stanford University between 1977 and 1978, where he collaborated with Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. These collaborations provided foundational theoretical frameworks that helped Thaler articulate the various economic anomalies he had observed, particularly around concepts such as the endowment effect. His work demonstrated how psychological insights are crucial to understanding individual economic behavior and market outcomes.
From 1978 to 1995, Thaler served as a faculty member at the SC Johnson College of Business at Cornell University. During this tenure, in 1989, he founded the Center for Behavioral Economics and Decision Research, marking a formal establishment of his specialized field within the institution. He gained significant attention through a regular column titled ‘Anomalies’ in the Journal of Economic Perspectives from 1987 to 1990, where he cataloged instances of economic behavior that diverged from traditional microeconomic theories. These columns were later compiled and published as ‘The Winner’s Curse’ by Princeton University Press in 1992, making his insights accessible to a broader audience. In 1995, Thaler accepted a position at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, where he has continued his pioneering work in behavioral economics.
Thaler’s academic contributions culminated in him being awarded the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel in 2017 for his profound contributions to behavioral economics. His research focuses on how human traits, such as limited rationality, social preferences, and lack of self-control, systematically influence economic decisions and market results. These findings have significantly impacted economic research and policy, leading to the development of ‘nudge theory,’ which advocates for designing choices to guide individuals towards better decisions without restricting their freedom. He is also the founder of Fuller & Thaler Asset Management, which applies behavioral economics in investment strategies, recognizing and capitalizing on cognitive biases in financial markets. He also co-founded and served as co-director of the National Bureau of Economic Research Behavioral Economics Project from 1991 to 2015, and was involved in the establishment of the British Government’s Behavioural Insights Team, known as the ‘nudge unit’.
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