In October 2026, Professor Xian XU, Vice Dean of the School of Economics, Fudan University, Head of the Department of Risk Management and Insurance, and Director of the China Insurance and Social Security Research Center of the Fudan Development Institute, was interviewed by Economic Voice of China Media Group on the academic contributions of the 2026 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences and the intrinsic link between insurance protection and macroeconomic stability in light of China’s economic realities. XU noted that this year’s prize, awarded to Robert HALL and Michael WOODFORD, lies in laying microeconomic foundations for macroeconomic stabilization policies: the macroeconomy is not abstract numbers but is jointly shaped by the economic behavior of countless households and firms, and economic agents make forward-looking decisions based on their judgments about the future, adjusting current consumption and investment. Modern macroeconomic regulation should therefore attend not only to macroeconomic indicators but also to the perceptions and expectations of micro agents; consistent, stable and predictable policies help boost market confidence. He said that in recent years the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences has focused on fundamental issues such as economic growth, long-term prosperity and public welfare, and this year’s award-winning work offers an approach to understanding the macroeconomy from micro behavior and analyzing policy effects through operating mechanisms, demonstrating the discipline’s value of serving society and the people. In view of China’s efforts to expand domestic demand, XU emphasized that the value of insurance protection lies not only in ex-post financial compensation after risks materialize, but also ex ante in reducing future uncertainty, lowering households’ precautionary savings, stabilizing livelihood expectations and thereby unlocking current consumption potential. Continuously improving the multi-tiered social security system and giving full play to the supplementary role of commercial insurance can achieve mutual reinforcement between improving people’s livelihood and expanding domestic demand—an important measure for enhancing people’s wellbeing and an institutional foundation for strengthening economic resilience and supporting macroeconomic stability.

Translated by FDDI

Full text in Chinese available at:

https://fddi.fudan.edu.cn/25/76/c18965a796022/page.htm