Nobel Prize Winner Delivers Beattie Family Lecture
March 23, 2010
George Akerlof delivered the 2010 Beattie Family Lecture in Business Law to a full house at Western Law on March 22. Akerlof spoke on the topic "Identity Economics".
Akerlof is a professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley and co-author of Identity Economics: How Our Identities Shape Our Work, Wages, and Well-Being.
His lecture explored how our identities are shaped by our economic decisions and behaviour. Akerlof argues that people’s identity, their conception of who they are, and of who they choose to be, may be the most important factor affecting their economic lives. And the limits placed by society on people's identity can also be crucial determinants of their economic well-being.
The Beattie Family Lecture Series in Business Law was established by Geoff Beattie, LLB '84, Western's $500-million volunteer fundraising campaign chair, and deputy chairman of Thomson Reuters and president of The Woodbridge Company Limited.
