In 2008, the CESifo Group and the International Institute of Public Finance (IIPF) established the Richard Musgrave Visiting Professorship, to honour the memory of one of Public Finance's greatest scholars. Richard Musgrave began his studies at the University of Munich and was a founding member of CESifo. This annual prize honours an outstanding scholar in the area of Public Finance. With this award the prize winner is also named a Distinguished CESifo Fellow.
The award winner is chosen through a formal selection process by the President and Vice Presidents of IIPF together with the President of the CESifo Group.
The 2012 award winner is Professor Eytan Sheshinski, Sir Isaac Wolfson Professor Emeritus of Public Finance and current member of the Academic Committee of Center for Rationality, both at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In addition he is a member of the Board of Directors and Investment Committee, Psagot Provident Fund, Ltd. He has been a CESifo Research Network Member since October 1999 and has published a number of CESifo Working Papers.
Professor Sheshinski has made contributions to the theory of technical progress and economic growth, the theory of income taxation and public goods, and the theory of firms' behaviour in the presence of inflation and adjustment costs. In recent years his research has focused on social insurance and markets for annuities, and on behavioural public economics (bounded rationality).
On 12 April 2012 as part of his visiting professorship, he delivered the fourth Richard Musgrave Lecture on the topic of "Socially Desirable Limits on Choice".
See the videos of the Richard Musgrave Lecture 2012. See the pictures of the Richard Musgrave Lecture 2012.
The 2011 award winner is Professor Timothy Besley, Director of the Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines (STICERD) and Kuwait Professor of Economics and Political Science Professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE).
From September 2006 to August 2009, he served as an external member of the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee. He is a CESifo Research Fellow, a Research Fellow at the Institute for Fiscal Studies and is a program member of the Institutions, Organizations and Growth Program of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR).
He is a Fellow of the Econometric Society, the British Academy, and the European Economics Association. He is also a foreign honorary member of the American Economic Association. Professor Besley is a past co-editor of the American Economic Review, and a 2005 winner of the Yrjö Jahnsson Award of the European Economics Association. His research, which mostly has a policy focus, is mainly in the areas of Development Economics, Public Economics and Political Economy.
On 8 April 2011 he delivered the third Richard Musgrave Lecture on the topic "Some Principles of Public Organization". Prior registration is mandatory. Please contact E-Mail: This e-mail address is protected against spambots. Please activate JavaScript in order to see them.
See the press release of 5 April 2011.
See the videos of the Richard Musgrave Lecture 2011.
On 7 July 2010 he held the second Richard Musgrave Lecture on the topic: "Taxing and Regulating the Financial Sector".
See the press release of 7 July 2010.
See the videos of the Richard Musgrave Lecture 2010.
See the pictures of the Richard Musgrave Lecture 2010.
Alan Auerbach is the Robert D. Burch Professor of Economics and Law and Director of the Burch Center for Tax Policy and Public Finance at the University of California, Berkeley. He is Associate Editor of the American Economic Review, Journal of Public Economics and seven other public finance journals.
On 25 May 2009, he gave the Richard Musgrave Lecture, on "Public Finance in Practice and Theory", at the University of Munich's Freskensaal (Frescoes Room). The paper was subsequently published in CESifo Economic Studies. Mr Auerbach also gave three graduate lectures dealing with topics in dynamic taxation policy.
See the videos of the Richard Musgrave Lecture 2009.
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