Dr. Roland Bénabou

Biography

Roland Bénabou joined the faculty of Princeton University in 1999, holding a joint appointment in the Department of Economics and the School of Public and International Affairs. His research spans both macroeconomic and microeconomic domains, focusing on the interplay of inflation, imperfect competition, speculation, and manipulation within financial markets. His recent work delves into inequality, growth, social mobility, political economy, and redistribution. He centers his studies on education, social interactions, and the socioeconomic structure of cities. Bénabou has significant contributions to economics psychology, particularly in behavioral economics, examining the balance between extrinsic incentives and intrinsic motivation, as well as the determinants of prosocial behavior influenced by both individual traits (such as overconfidence and wishful thinking) and collective dynamics (including groupthink and market manias). He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and holds fellowships from various prestigious institutions. Bénabou served as co-editor of the American Economic Review from 2014 to 2020 and has been recognized with multiple awards, including the Jean-Jacques Laffont Prize from the Toulouse School of Economics.

Research Interests