VERY VERY happy to see this news yesterday.
I've been a fan of Mokyr for over a decade -- I'll compile a reading list for the Stackers later this week (and @siggy47 will keep me honest in case I don't): Gifts of Athena and definitely A Culture of Growth are worthy investigations into the industrial revolution and the most important question in all of economics:
Why Are We Rich?
(I wrote about A Culture of Growth back in 2016... can't find it; I'm sure some internet sleuth/Stacker will since the internet never forgets)
Anyway, fourth prize in a row with DECENT economic history components to it; I'm not complaining.
The award is well deserved—and a reflection of how intellectual currents are changing. Mr Mokyr is an economist and a historian. He is also an inbetweener; not fully happy in either camp. He writes better than almost any of his wonky peers, producing books that even a layman might be tempted to pull from the shelf. But he reasons like an economist, and is not afraid of numbers, putting him outside the mainstream of academic history, too. Were he to enter academia today, he might struggle to get a top-tier job.
Good summary:
For the vast majority of human history, GDP did not rise. Then, around the mid-18th century, it shot up. Mr Mokyr places high value on the power of ideas to explain this shift. The argument of A Culture of Growth, published in 2016, is straightforward. Around the 17th century, European cultural norms changed in a manner that was conducive to scientific experimentation and discovery, and then the commercialisation of those ideas.
Also, this was a LOL'd comment:
It is gratifying to see Mr Mokyr win the award. For one thing, he is a nice man who offers journalists from The Economist constructive feedback when he bumps into them at conferences.
"enjoy the novelty of being able to enjoy reading the work of a Nobel-prizewinning economist"
ARchive: https://archive.md/lV4YD