Paul Krugman

Paul Krugman was born in New York in 1953.⁠[1]

He holds a BA in economics from Yale UniversityYale UniversityYale University is a research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Its predecessor, the Collegiate School, received a charter in 1701. Trustees chose New Haven in 1716; the institution became Yale College in 1718 and Yale University in 1887. Yale provides undergraduate, graduate and professional education and has 14 undergraduate residential colleges. As of October 2026, its president was Maurie McInnis, who took office in July 2024. In 2026, Yale expanded aid for incoming undergraduates and celebrated its 325th anniversary.Open the full entry and a PhD in economics from MIT. He was an assistant professor at Yale from 1977 to 1980, associate professor at MIT from 1980 to 1984 and professor there from 1984, moved to Stanford UniversityStanford UniversityStanford University is a research university in California founded by Leland and Jane Stanford in 1885 and opened in 1891.Open the full entry as a professor from 1994 to 1996, and returned to MIT from 1996 to 2000.⁠[2]

In his twenties he served as senior international economist for the President’s Council of Economic Advisers under Ronald Reagan, and he has consulted for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the World Bank, the International Monetary FundInternational Monetary FundThe International Monetary Fund (IMF) is an international financial institution conceived at the 1944 Bretton Woods conference, whose Articles entered into force in 1945 and which began operations on March 1, 1947; headquartered in Washington, it has 191 member countries and has been led by Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva since October 2019.Open the full entry and the United Nations, among others.⁠[3]

In 1991 the American Economic Association awarded him the John Bates Clark Medal, calling him the outstanding international economist of his generation; the citation notes that his 1979 Journal of International Economics article “Increasing Returns, Monopolistic Competition, and International Trade” and related papers, together with work by Elhanan Helpman, Avinash Dixit and others, reoriented trade theory into a “new trade theory” able to explain the large volume of trade between similarly endowed countries.⁠[4]

On January 2, 2000, he published his first New York Times column, a broad essay on the world economy, beginning nearly 25 years as a Times columnist.⁠[5]

Before joining The New York Times he wrote a monthly column, “The Dismal Science”, for the online magazine SlateSlate AutoSlate Auto is a U.S. electric vehicle company established in 2022 that is developing a customizable all-electric pickup with a starting price of $24,950, to be assembled in Indiana.Open the full entry and was a columnist for Fortune.⁠[6]

The Great Unraveling, published in 2003, became a New York Times bestseller in both hardcover and paperback; with his wife, Robin Wells, he co-wrote the college textbooks Microeconomics and Macroeconomics, published in October 2004 and September 2005.⁠[6]

On June 23, 2004, a jury in Oviedo awarded him the 2004 Prince of Asturias Award for Social Sciences, saying his work had contributed outstandingly to establishing the foundations of the new theory of international trade and that its hallmark was the application of research outcomes to real living and welfare conditions.⁠[7]

On October 13, 2008, he was the sole winner of that year’s $1.4 million Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his analysis of how economies of scale affect trade patterns and the location of economic activity; the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said he had integrated the previously disparate research fields of international trade and economic geography.⁠[8]

Speaking to a news conference by telephone, he compared the financial meltdown with the 1990s Asian crisis, saying “This is terrifying.”⁠[8]

In 2011 his New York Times blog, The Conscience of a Liberal, was ranked number one among The 25 Best Financial Blogs by Time magazine.⁠[3]

In April 2012 Norton published End This Depression Now!, which argues that despite financial stabilization people’s living conditions had not improved and calls for stimulus on a more expansive scale, including large-scale job creation, debt relief and a reversal of austerity, to end the crisis.⁠[9]

On February 28, 2014, he announced on his New York Times blog that he would leave Princeton University, where he had taught since 2000, in June 2015 to take a position at the City University of New York, explaining that his work had shifted toward public policy and that the move was no comment on Princeton.⁠[10]

He said he had approached the Graduate Center’s Luxembourg Income Study Center about an affiliation and was unexpectedly also offered a faculty appointment; the executive committee of CUNY’s economics department approved his nomination on February 27.⁠[11]

In July 2014 he began a nine-month term as a distinguished scholar at the Graduate Center’s Luxembourg Income Study Center, ahead of joining CUNY’s economics faculty in August 2015 to focus on public policy and income inequality; he said the research he was most proud of concerned Japan’s prolonged stagnation in the 1990s.⁠[12]

On January 21, 2020, he appeared on the Lex Fridman Podcast in an episode titled “Economics of Innovation, Automation, Safety Nets & Universal Basic Income”; the episode summary says his academic work centers on international economics, economic geography, liquidity traps and currency crises, and the conversation covered competition, safety nets, regulation of the tech sector, automation, universal basic income and international trade.⁠[13]

On January 28, 2020, Norton published Arguing with Zombies, a collection of more than 90 articles, most from his New York Times columns, arranged in 18 sections on topics including Social Security, health care, the 2008 financial crisis, austerity, taxes, trade wars, inequality and climate change.⁠[14]

On February 3, 2021, he published his first post on Substack, launching a personal newsletter.⁠[15]

On December 6, 2024, New York Times Opinion editor Kathleen Kingsbury announced in an internal memo that he would retire from the paper at the end of the year after nearly 25 years as a columnist, praising his authoritative voice and clear style.⁠[5]

He had been asked to reduce the frequency of his pieces, particularly of his personal newsletter, and declined, moving his writing to Substack; by July 2025 his Substack newsletter had about 400,000 subscribers.⁠[16]

As of October 2026 he still teaches at the CUNY Graduate Center and writes mainly in his Substack newsletter; he describes his major appointments as MIT (1980–2000), Princeton (2000–2015) and, since 2015, the CUNY Graduate Center.⁠[17]

Personal website: Public link: https://paulkrugman.substack.com/ (opens in a new window)⁠[17]