RES Young Economist 2010 - Winners Announced

The following announcement has just been made by the RES about the final judging for the RES Young Economist of the Year 2010.

The final shortlisted entries for the competition were by:

Talitha Patterson-Gordon (Oundle School)
Aydin Emre Osborne Dikerdem (Elliott School, Battersea)
Sue Lyn Stubbs (The British School of Costa Rica)
Jessica Hawley (Stratford upon Avon Grammar School for Girls)
Jason Parisi (Chesham High School)
Anjney Midha (Saint Andrews Junior College, Singapore)
Jago McKenzie (City of London School for Boys)
Samuel Burke (Colchester Royal Grammar School)
Matthew Cordwell (Cranleigh School)
Bryony Henry (Ipswich School)
Babatunde Onabajo (Bishop Challoner Catholic Collegiate School, East London)
Tilly King (Cheltenham College)
Dasha Dobrogordkaya (d’Overbroeck’s College)
Sarisher Mann (Highfields Science Specialist School, Wolverhampton)
Alex Springer (Wilson’s School)
Krishna Patel (Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boy’s School)
Alexander Suchanek (Tiffin Boys School)

The final stage was judged by RES Council Members Charlie Bean of the Bank of England, Stephanie Flanders, Economics Editor BBC and Richard Blundell as President of the RES.

Before conferring, we each independently identified our top three.

We agreed that the best essay was by Jessica Hawley. Her essay on the topic “What are the best economic policies to curb alcohol consumption: The Economic Alcoholic” was judged to be a brilliantly constructed essay. Told from the point of view of a recovering alcoholic it presented all of the key policy issues in a lucid and engaging way. The problem of assuming rational choice for heavy drinkers was clearly conveyed as was the potential of tax rises to induce a shift to cheaper forms of alcohol – from ‘Remy Martin to cooking brandy’. Minimum prices, age limits, opening hours and advertising bans were all weighed up in a concise and balanced manner, persuasively arguing for a combination of policies.

We placed Alexander Suchanek second. His essay on the topic “Foreign Aid Hampers Development: Discuss ” was a clear and well-articulated essay arguing that, while development aid can lead to a dependency culture, with good governance and a good local knowledge aid can be effective for development. Ideas from game theory and economic logic were used to make the case for microfinance initiatives and to show how poorly designed aid programmes can create adverse incentives for private investment and can also distort government decisions.

In third place was Sarisher Mann whose answer to “How do we prevent house price bubbles in the future?” was an attractive blend of well chosen empirical evidence and good economic intuition used to argue that house price bubbles cannot be solely attributed to the expansion of the sub-prime mortgage market. Germany and Spain, where regulation prevented extensive sub-prime lending, were shown to have experienced historic episodes of severe housing bubbles. The essay used this evidence to make the case for more general banking and fiscal policies to prevent house price bubbles.

The 2010 Young Economist of the Year is therefore Jessica Hawley, who will receive a prize of £1,000. Second place Alexander Suchanek will receive £500, and third place Sarisher Mann will get £500 each. The plan is to award the prizes to the winners at John Van Reenen’s annual public lecture in London on 2 December.

Charlie Bean, Richard Blundell, Stephanie Flanders, Jim Riley (Managing Director, Tutor2u Limited)

10 August 2010

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