From wrestler to economist (Image: Jos Schmid)

Austrian economist Ernst Fehr tells Mark Buchanan why global economics could benefit from a touch of compassion and why a good wrestler never gives up

FROM outside economist Ernst Fehr’s office at the University of Zurich in Switzerland you would have no idea that he had been tipped to win a Nobel economics prize. For one thing, the name on the door looks as if it has been dashed off on the cheapest of departmental printers.

But Fehr himself seems to fit the bill. Smiling broadly, he extends a hand, eager to talk …