The Nobel Prize for Economics went to three US-based academics: Joshua D. Angrist, David Card, and Guido W. Imbens. Card earned his award for work on labor economics, while Angrist and Imbens contributed to the analysis of causal relationships.

Card, 65-years old, is a University of California-based professor of economics, while his partner, Angrist, is 61 and the Ford professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Imbens, the youngest of the three at 58, is based at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he is also a professor.

According to the Nobel Prize committee who chose the laureates, the three winners ” provided us with new insights about the labor market and shown what conclusions about cause and effect can be drawn from natural experiments.”

The committee added that the approach the researchers took to exploring social questions had “revolutionized empirical research.”