A superb choice. Here is the official Nobel page for Edmund Phelps. Here is some information on his work that led to the prize. Here is a classic Wall Street Journal op-ed from 1996.
Tyler Cowen has the best blog entry that I read today.
Like Cowen, I find it hard to classify Phelps into a single category. Unlike fellow Laureates Friedman and Lucas, Phelps did not become the leader of a particular school of thought. Yet his ideas were picked up by a wide swath of the profession. In fact, New Keynesians and Neoclassicals alike can trace their lineage through Phelps' papers. Reading the titles of some of his papers from the '60s and '70s remind a person of just how far ahead of the curve he was.
Concerning the overall meaning of this prize, Cowen says it well.
Relevance and breadth triumph over narrow technical skill.
I only knew Phelps as the second half of Friedman-Phelps, as in "the Friedman-Phelps critique of the Phillips curve".
I'm a bit unhappy that the chose someone with a lot of normative work. Normative work is best put under political science or moral philosophy, not economics... in my not so humble opinion... but in the past they've awarded Nozick-ians too, and people too weird (normative-wise) to mention so it's not so bad... I just hope it doesn't start a Rawls revival in economics circles!
On the other hand, the work on the limits of RE might be worth reviving.
Then you might not like my next post....
No way! ;-)