Spinoza prize

The Spinoza Prize is the highest scientific award in the Netherlands and it is awarded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). The Spinoza Prize is given annually to three or four researchers working in the Netherlands who, by international standards, are the absolute top of their field. The laureates each receive 2.5 million euros, which must be spent on scientific research. The first Spinoza laureate at Tilburg University was Economics Professor Lans Bovenberg in 2003. He received the Spinoza prize for co-developing the double-dividend model, which helps to improve our understanding of the combination of environmental and taxation issues, which are hard to grasp from an economics point of view. Referees put Bovenberg in the top three percent of all economists worldwide and in the top one percent in the field of public finance.

Bovenberg first winnner

Lans Bovenberg (1958) is an authority in multiple fields: environmental economy, government finance, taxation, pensions, ageing, the economy, social security and economics education. Using the Spinoza Prize money, he founded the Network for Studies on Pensions, Aging and Retirement (Netspar) in 2005. At that point, he was a Professor of Economics and the Scientific Director of the Center for Economic Research (CentER) at the Economics Faculty. In 2009, Bovenberg joined the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences (KNAW). He received honorary doctorates from the Universities of Ghent (2008) and St Gallen (2010) and he was granted a Knighthood of the Order of the Dutch Lion in 2011. His ancillary activities include policy and advisory work for the Christian Democrats (CDA) and the Social and Economic Council of the Netherlands (SER), serving as its deputy crown-appointed member since 2006. For many years, Bovenberg topped the three main Dutch economics hit lists: the ESB and TPE Polder Parade (based on citations in Dutch professional literature), the Intermediair Economists Top 40 (international publications) and the ESB Economists Top (international citations). In response to the credit crunch and the crisis of confidence this gave rise to in the economic sciences, Bovenberg decided to dedicate himself to innovating economics education. To this purpose, he has held the F.J.D. Goldschmeding chair in Tilburg since April 2015, aiming to develop a new economics learning method for secondary education.