American Economist Receives Heinz König Young Scholar Award Endowed With Prize Money of Euro 5,000

The Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW) in Mannheim awarded the Heinz König Young Scholar Award for the seventh time. This year the award goes to Xuguang Sheng from the USA. Sheng is conducting research on the relation between economic uncertainty and the varying economic outlooks by experts. Shen is a lecturer at the American University in Washington D.C..

The annual ZEW award comes with prize money of Euro 5,000 and additionally includes the offer to conduct research at the ZEW for a couple of months. This year, Deutsche Telekom AG sponsors the award.

The central questions of Sheng's research are why economic experts often differ in their opinion and if there is a relation between the different opinions and the risks for future economic development. In particular by answering the latter, Sheng and his co-authors Kajal Lahiri and Huaming Peng make an important contribution to an ongoing debate.

The Heinz König Young Scholar Award is named after the ZEW founding director, Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Heinz König. The prize awards excellent empirical papers by young researchers. ZEW does not want to add another prize to the wide range of awards for established researchers but prefers to sponsor young economists.

The Heinz König Young Scholar Award is awarded every year to the author of the best paper at the end of the ZEW Summer Workshop. Young researchers have to submit papers about their research. All submitted papers are thoroughly checked and the best are chosen. This year, 14 young researchers from South America, North America and Europe were invited to ZEW, Mannheim. They were able to discuss their research with other young researchers and renowned economists.

For further information please contact

Prof. Dr. Michael Schröder, Phone: +49 (0)621/1235-140, E-mail: schroeder@zew.de