Kevin Murphy is the George J. Stigler Professor of Economics, as well as a professor in the Booth Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago. He was selected as a MacArthur Fellow for "revealing economic forces shaping vital social phenomena such as wage inequality, unemployment, addiction, medical research, and economic growth." He primarily studies the empirical analysis of inequality, unemployment and relative wages, as well as the economics of growth and development and the economic value of improvements in health and longevity.
In 2007, Murphy and fellow Chicago Booth faculty member Robert Topel won the Kenneth J. Arrow Award for the best research paper in health economics.

A fellow of the Econometric Society, a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research, Murphy was also a John Bates Clark Medalist in 1997. He has received fellowships from the Earhart Foundation, the Sloan Foundation, and the Friedman Fund.