David Spenser writes:   Academic economics won in this year’s Nobel Prize Award.  Academic economics is still stuck in an intellectual and ideological rut. Despite the global financial crisis – the worst in a lifetime – academic economists are more likely to win awards and the respect of their peers by producing abstruse models than by tackling and resolving real-world problems.

The economics Nobel awards advances in economic analysis – meaning the development of formal models and the application of particular mathematical and statistical techniques. In essence, solving puzzles within economics matters more than dealing with grand societal challenges.

It should be a cause of concern, not least for members of the public tuning in to learn who has won the economics Nobel, that acute economic and social issues are not high on the agenda of academic economics.  Thomas Piketty was ignored.  Academic economics is still all of a type – it stands for some version of neo-classical economics.  Cosmetic differences aside, research in academic economics applies concepts and methods found in this narrow school of thought.

It has dominated economic thinking since the late 19th century and has marginalised all challengers. The award of the economics Nobel is, in fact, an award for conformity to neo-classical economics. Other schools of economic thought do not get a look in.

And this is in spite of the fact that neo-classical economic thinking failed to foresee the global financial crisis and advocates the kind of austerity policies that prevent recovery. It is alternative thinking – whether from Keynesian, Marxian or ecological economics – that can help us to understand how to build a fairer and more equal economy.

A prize for thinking differently and building a better economics would be a great thing, but sadly it is not one that is awarded by the committee of the economics Nobel. Indeed, given the acute problems that exist in academic economics, it may even be time to call an end to the economics Nobel. The world certainly would not be a worse place without it.