Author Guide · Behavioural Economics
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In October 2017 the Nobel committee gave the economics prize to Richard H. Thaler for building “psychologically realistic assumptions” into the study of economic decisions. Asked what he would do with the money, he said he would spend it “as irrationally as possible.” Thaler, born in New Jersey in 1945, spent his career collecting the ways real people break the rules of textbook economics: they value a mug more once they own it, they ignore retirement plans unless they are enrolled by default. His books took those findings out of the journals, first in a long-running column of “Anomalies”, then in Nudge, written with the legal scholar Cass Sunstein, which has sold more than two million copies. This guide covers his six key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 6 key books · 1991–2025 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Richard Thaler’s best-known books are Nudge (2008), written with Cass R. Sunstein, and Misbehaving (2015), his history of behavioural economics. Earlier he collected his academic work in Quasi Rational Economics (1991) and The Winner’s Curse (1992); a revised Nudge: The Final Edition followed in 2021 and a new Winner’s Curse, with Alex Imas, in 2025. Start with Misbehaving, which tells how the ideas behind all the others came about.
Where to Start with Richard Thaler
If you want the story of behavioural economics
→ Misbehaving (2015) — his own account of how the field was built.
If you want the book that changed government policy
→ Nudge (2008) — the original 2008 edition.
If you want the most up-to-date version of nudging
→ Nudge: The Final Edition (2021) — rewritten, with a new chapter on “sludge”.
If you want the research findings themselves
→ The Winner’s Curse (2025) — the anomalies revisited decades later.
6 Richard Thaler Books, in Order
Quasi Rational Economics
A collection of Thaler’s academic papers from the 1980s, published by the Russell Sage Foundation. Its argument is that standard theory, which assumes people act rationally in their own interest, predicts markets poorly because it ignores systematic errors in how people judge and decide. It is written for economists rather than general readers.
The Winner’s Curse
His “Anomalies” columns from the Journal of Economic Perspectives, each describing a finding that standard economics could not explain. The title column is about auctions, where the winning bidder tends to be the one who most overestimated the value of what was for sale. Several columns were written with collaborators, among them Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky.
Nudge
Written with the law professor Cass R. Sunstein and published by Yale University Press in April 2008. It argues for “libertarian paternalism”: designing the “choice architecture” around people, such as defaults or the order of food in a cafeteria, so that they make better choices while staying free to choose otherwise. Its examples include automatic enrolment in pension plans and the Save More Tomorrow savings scheme. The Economist named it one of the best books of 2008.
Misbehaving
Part memoir, part history of the field, published by W. W. Norton. Thaler tells how he began listing the ways people depart from economic theory as a graduate student, his collaboration with Kahneman and Tversky, and the long resistance from mainstream economists. Along the way he applies the ideas to household finance, game shows, the NFL draft and companies such as Uber.
Nudge: The Final Edition
A rewrite of Nudge from cover to cover, published by Penguin in August 2021, drawing on the authors’ experience in and out of government since 2008. It cuts some of the original chapters, adds material on COVID-19, mortgages and climate change, and introduces “sludge”: the paperwork and other friction that keeps people from what they want. The authors called it final because they did not plan to revise it again.
The Winner’s Curse
Written with the economist Alex O. Imas and published by Simon & Schuster in October 2025. Each chapter opens with one of the original “Anomalies” columns, then asks how the finding has held up and how the field has moved on since, with examples from retirement saving, credit card debt, professional golfers’ putts and portfolio managers’ stock sales.
In What Order to Read Richard Thaler
The two early books are collections of academic work and assume some economics; the later four were written for general readers. You do not need the early ones to follow the later ones.
Read Misbehaving first: it explains where each idea came from, including the ones that became Nudge. For Nudge, choose between the original 2008 edition and The Final Edition (2021); the second is a rewrite, not a sequel, so one of the two is enough. Finish with the 2025 Winner’s Curse, which checks the original findings against decades of later research.
A reading path
1. Misbehaving (2015)
2. Nudge: The Final Edition (2021)
3. The Winner’s Curse: Then and Now (2025)
4. Quasi Rational Economics (1991)
Everything Else Richard Thaler Published
Beyond the 6 key books: 2 more, grouped by kind.
Open a group with the + to see every book in it.
Edited volumes
2
2 books · 1993–2005
- 1993Advances in Behavioral Financea collection of research papers he edited, Russell Sage Foundation
- 2005Advances in Behavioral Finance, Volume IIa second collection, Princeton University Press and Russell Sage Foundation
The years · 1945–2025
Quick facts about Richard H. Thaler
- Known for
- Richard Thaler is known as a founder of behavioural economics and for the idea of the “nudge”, for which work he received the 2017 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences.
- 1945
- Born in East Orange, New Jersey
- 1995
- Joins the University of Chicago
- 2008
- Nudge
- 2025
- The Winner’s Curse revisited, with Alex Imas
- Born
- 12 September 1945, East Orange, New Jersey; his father was an actuary at Prudential
- Education
- Case Western Reserve University (BA, 1967); University of Rochester (MA 1970, PhD 1974)
- Taught
- Rochester, Cornell (1978–1995), then the University of Chicago Booth School of Business
- Co-author
- Cass R. Sunstein, on Nudge (2008 and 2021)
- Honours
- Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (2017); president of the American Economic Association, 2015–2016
- Policy
- Helped set up the UK’s Behavioural Insights Team, the “Nudge Unit”, in 2010
The red mark is 2008: Nudge, the book that took his ideas into government policy.
How Richard Thaler Writes: Economics with Humans in It
Thaler builds his arguments from small, concrete puzzles rather than models. His Nobel lecture was titled “From Cashews to Nudges”, after an early observation that dinner guests were relieved when a bowl of cashews was taken away, something a fully rational person should never want. The “Anomalies” columns behind The Winner’s Curse follow the same pattern: one finding, the evidence for it, and why standard theory cannot account for it.
He writes for people outside economics. Nudge contrasts the rational “Econs” of textbooks with the “Humans” who actually make decisions, and turns each finding into a practical design question: what the default should be, how options are ordered, what is easy and what is hard. Misbehaving adds himself as a character, a self-described “rabble rouser” arguing with colleagues who thought psychology had no place in economics.
Much of his work is collaborative: with Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky on the early research, with Cass Sunstein on Nudge, and with Alex Imas on the 2025 Winner’s Curse. Readers who want the psychology underneath his economics will find it in Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow (2011).
Frequently asked questions about Richard Thaler’s books
How many books has Richard Thaler written?
Six as author or co-author, the key books on this page: Quasi Rational Economics (1991), The Winner’s Curse (1992), Nudge (2008), Misbehaving (2015), Nudge: The Final Edition (2021) and The Winner’s Curse: Behavioral Economics Anomalies, Then and Now (2025). He also edited two volumes of Advances in Behavioral Finance (1993 and 2005).
What are Richard Thaler’s books in order?
Quasi Rational Economics (1991), The Winner’s Curse (1992), Nudge (2008, with Cass R. Sunstein), Misbehaving (2015), Nudge: The Final Edition (2021, with Sunstein) and The Winner’s Curse: Then and Now (2025, with Alex O. Imas).
Where should I start with Richard Thaler?
Misbehaving (2015). It is written for general readers and explains how each of his main ideas came about, including the ones behind Nudge.
What is Richard Thaler’s most famous book?
Nudge (2008), written with Cass R. Sunstein. It introduced the idea of “choice architecture” to a wide audience and has sold more than two million copies, according to its publisher.
Should I read the original Nudge or The Final Edition?
One is enough. The Final Edition (2021) is a cover-to-cover rewrite rather than a sequel: it drops some chapters, updates the examples and adds a chapter on “sludge”. The 2008 edition is the one that influenced governments in the years after it appeared.
Why did Richard Thaler win the Nobel Prize?
The 2017 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, announced on 9 October 2017, recognised his work incorporating psychologically realistic assumptions into the analysis of economic decision-making. He gave his Nobel lecture, “From Cashews to Nudges: The Evolution of Behavioral Economics”, in Stockholm on 8 December 2017.
Is Richard Thaler in The Big Short?
Yes. He appears as himself in the 2015 film, alongside Selena Gomez, helping to explain the “hot hand” fallacy.
Do nudges actually work?
It is debated. Governments set up hundreds of “nudge units” after the book, and Thaler points to automatic enrolment in pensions, where enrolment rates rise above 90%. A 2022 reanalysis in PNAS by Maximilian Maier and colleagues argued that, once publication bias is accounted for, there is no evidence that nudges are effective in general; critics such as Gerd Gigerenzer have argued that the term has been stretched too far.
Is Richard Thaler still alive?
Yes. He was born on 12 September 1945 in East Orange, New Jersey, and teaches at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. His most recent book, written with Alex Imas, appeared in October 2025.
What is the difference between Richard Thaler and Daniel Kahneman?
Kahneman was a psychologist whose research with Amos Tversky described how people judge and decide; Thaler is an economist who applied those findings to markets, savings and policy. They worked together from the late 1970s, and Kahneman won the economics Nobel in 2002, fifteen years before Thaler.
Footnotes
- Richard Thaler — Wikipedia
- Richard H. Thaler, biographical — NobelPrize.org
- Nudge (book) — Wikipedia
- Nudge: The Final Edition — Penguin Random House
- Papers and books — Richard Thaler, Chicago Booth
- No evidence for nudging after adjusting for publication bias — PNAS, 2022
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“I am admittedly a rabble rouser who enjoys stirring the pot and challenging conventional wisdom.”
— Richard H. Thaler, Nobel Prize biographical essay (2017)
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