George A. Akerlof

Daniel E. Koshland, Sr. Distinguished Professor of Economics, Nobel Laureate 2001, Professor of the Graduate School

Fields: Macroeconomics, Monetary theory, Behavioral Economics

Research interests: Sociology and economics; theory of unemployment; assymetric information; staggered contract theory; money demand; labor market flows; theory of business cycles; economics of social customs; measurement of unemployment; economics of discrimination;

George Akerlof was educated at Yale and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he received his PhD in 1966, the same year he became an assistant professor at Berkeley. He became a full professor in 1978.

Professor Akerlof is a 2001 recipient of the Alfred E. Nobel Prize in Economic Science; he was honored for his theory of asymmetric information and its effect on economic behavior. He is also the 2006 President of the American Economic Association. He served earlier as vice president and member of the executive committee. He is also on the North American Council of the Econometric Association.