2006 Leontief Prize

2006 Leontief Prize
Awarded to Juliet Schor and Samuel Bowles

Professor Juliet Schor was honored for her work on trends in labor and leisure, consumption, the economics of families, and economic justice. Her first well-known book, The Overworked American, described the time pressures, competition, and consumerism of late 20th-century America. This was followed by The Overspent American, and most recently by Born to Buy: The Commercialized Child and the New Consumer Culture. Her current research interests include the commercialization of childhood, and the environmental sustainability of American lifestyles. Dr. Schor directed the Women Studies Program at Harvard University and taught in the Harvard economics department before becoming a Professor of Sociology at Boston College. Dr. Schor is also a board member and co-founder of the Center for a New American Dream, an organization devoted to transforming North American lifestyles to make them more ecologically and socially sustainable. More on Dr. Schor’s work can be read at: https://www.bc.edu/bc-web/schools/mcas/departments/sociology/people/faculty-directory/juliet-schor.html 

Professor Samuel Bowles was honored for his groundbreaking work as an innovator in microeconomics over the last 40 years. His work on the structure of labor and capital markets and the organization of work has led to the theory of “contested exchange,” demonstrating how markets naturally create persistent inequalities of wealth and power.  His current research focuses on the evolution of institutions, behavior, and preferences, and on the causes and consequences of inequality.  Dr. Bowles combines empirical and theoretical work in economics and many related disciplines, along with sophisticated mathematical tools, to address questions of broad social and political importance. Now nominally retired from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, he divides his time between U-Mass, the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico (where he heads the Behavioral Sciences Program), and the University of Siena in Italy. More information on Dr. Bowles’ work can be read at: http://www.santafe.edu/~bowles/