An ability to analyse sequences and future decisions is crucial in the realm of economics, Professor Finn Kydland, a Norwegian Nobel Laureate economist, told attendees during a keynote speech at a recent event.
Mr Kydland's dynamic macroeconomics research, The Time Consistency of Economic Policy and the Driving Forces Behind Business Cycles, which he co-wrote with American economist Edward Prescott, won them the Nobel Prize in 2004.
Their groundbreaking paper, inspired by the subject of time consistency, aimed to improve the welfare of the world population.
According to him, addressing the people's welfare issues and choosing the most essential economic policy should be based on each country's characteristics.
"The ultimate goal was to improve welfare for people in general, although we focused especially on subareas in industrialised nations in Africa, which were facing more pressing issues, " he said.
Through his study, he found that unfit economic policies, especially trade barriers, are the most prevalent blockade to improving people's welfare in developing and developed countries.
"I had worked on several other issues where time consistency played a role in the economy.
"However, I discovered that it was different in the context of economic policy. And to come up with the solution that can help remove barrier policies to thoroughly reach the greater population is important," he said.
The Nobel Laureate said implementing economics in today's fast-changing world requires great analytical tools.
"I always tell my students: 'Learn as much mathematics as you can and improve your ability to analyse sequences.'"
"In the economic perspective, the main importance is the ability to analyse future decisions because that is what macroeconomics is all about," he said.
As a Henley Professor of Economics at the University of California, Santa Barbara, in the United States, Mr Kydland says he loves to give his students regular and sound advice.
"One of the first things I often ask my students is, 'What questions are you trying to answer, and do you have any example of empirical regularity to test it?' That suggests that the question is important and imperative to answer.
"Then, of course, I suggest and encourage them to give me more model economies they want to use to give as precise an answer to the question as they can.
"It is a general progress of studying."
Prof Kydland and eight other Nobel Laureates were the keynote speakers in the Japan-Asean Bridges event series, recently organised by the Vienna-based International Peace Foundation, to support education in Thailand.