Daron Acemoğlu, Simon Johnson, James Robinson win economics Nobel for work on wealth inequality

The Nobel prize in economics was awarded on Monday to Turkish-American Daron Acemoğlu and British-Americans Simon Johnson and James Robinson for research into wealth inequality between nations.

By examining the various political and economic systems introduced by European colonisers, the three have been able to demonstrate a relationship between institutions and prosperity, the jury said.

"Reducing the vast differences in income between countries is one of our time's greatest challenges," Jakob Svensson, chair of the Committee for the Prize in Economic Sciences, said in a statement.

"The laureates have demonstrated the importance of societal institutions for achieving this," Svensson added.

Acemoğlu, 57, is a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), as is Johnson, 61.

Robinson, 64, is a professor at the University of Chicago.

The jury highlighted the laureates' work illuminating how societal institutions play a role in explaining why some countries prosper, while others do not.

"I am delighted. It's just a real shock and amazing news," Acemoğlu told a reporters via telephone as the award was announced in Stockholm.

The economics prize is the only Nobel not among the original five created in the will of Swedish scientist Alfred Nobel, who died in 1896.

It was instead created through a donation from the Swedish central bank in 1968, leading detractors to dub it "a false Nobel".

However, like for the other Nobel science prizes, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences decides the winner and follows the same selection process.

The economics prize wraps up this year's Nobel season, which honoured achievements in artificial intelligence for the physics and chemistry prizes,...