Experimental Economics

Experimental Economics may be said to have come of age in 2002 with the award to Vernon Smith of the Nobel Memorial Prize. As the Award Committee noted, economics had long been viewed as ‘a non-experimental science that had to rely exclusively on field data’, a view that was perceived by many as ‘an obstacle to the continued development of economics as a science’. Unless, it was argued, ‘controlled experiments could be carried out, tests of economic theory would remain restricted’ since, s…