Richard D. Wolff

He received a BA in history from Harvard College in 1963, an MA in economics from 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 in 1964, an MA in history 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 in 1967 and a PhD in economics from Yale in 1969.⁠[1]

He taught at Yale University from 1967 to 1969 and at the City College of New York from 1969 to 1973, then taught economics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst from 1973 to 2008; in 1994 he was a visiting professor at the University of Paris I.⁠[2]

His research interests include the critical comparison of neoclassical, Keynesian and Marxian theories and the application of class analysis to contemporary global capitalism; with Stephen Resnick he co-wrote books including The Economics of Colonialism: Britain and Kenya, Knowledge and Class: A Marxian Critique of Political Economy and Economics: Marxian versus Neoclassical, and with Harriet Fraad and Resnick he co-wrote Bringing it all Back Home: Class and Gender in the Modern Household.⁠[3]

In 1988 he was among the founders of the academic Association of Economic and Social Analysis (AESA) and its quarterly journal, Rethinking Marxism.⁠[4]

In 2008 the Media Education Foundation released his 57-minute lecture film Capitalism Hits the Fan: The Economic Meltdown of 2008, in which he traces the roots of the crisis to the 1970s, when American wages began to stagnate, and argues that it reflects structural failures within American-style capitalism.⁠[5]

From early 2011 he wrote a weekly column for the Guardian, as a visiting professor in The New School’s graduate program in International Affairs, applying a neo-Marxist analysis to the causes and consequences of the financial crisis; he had earlier published Capitalism Hits the Fan: The Global Economic Meltdown and What to Do About It (Olive Branch, 2009).⁠[6]

In 2012 MIT Press published Contending Economic Theories: Neoclassical, Keynesian, and Marxian, co-written with Stephen Resnick, which compares the starting points and internal logic of the three theories chapter by chapter and discusses how the theoretical landscape shifted after the 2008 collapse.⁠[7]

In 2012 he founded Democracy at Work (d@w) to promote moving beyond capitalism through transforming the workplace; it produces his weekly show Economic Update.⁠[1]

The organisation describes itself as a worker-led, small-donor-funded non-profit that makes free, ad-free shows and accessible books advocating democracy in the workplace.⁠[8]

On February 24, 2020, as Bernie Sanders emerged as the Democratic front-runner, he debated Nobel laureate Paul KrugmanPaul KrugmanPaul Krugman is an economist who was the sole winner of the 2008 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his work on new trade theory and economic geography; after teaching at Yale, MIT, Stanford and Princeton he has been a Distinguished Professor at the CUNY Graduate Center since 2015. He wrote a New York Times column from 2000 to 2024 and has since written mainly on Substack; he appeared on the Lex Fridman Podcast in 2020.Open the full entry on Democracy Now! about Sanders and democratic socialism; Krugman had earlier written a column headlined “Bernie Sanders Isn’t a Socialist.”⁠[9]

As of March 2021 Economic Update was syndicated on more than 70 radio stations across the United States and available on Free Speech TV.⁠[2]

On June 17, 2022, he appeared as a Marxist philosopher and economist on episode 295 of the Lex FridmanLex FridmanLex Fridman is a Soviet-born, US-raised computer scientist and podcast host who works as an MIT research scientist on human-AI interaction and autonomous driving. His Lex Fridman Podcast is known for hours-long conversations with guests including heads of state and technology leaders.Open the full entry Podcast, titled “Marxism and Communism,” covering Marxism, communism, human nature, capitalism, governments and corporations, Stalinism, socialism versus Marxism, and Bernie Sanders and AOC.⁠[10]

As of October 2026 he is professor of economics emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a visiting professor in The New School’s graduate program in International Affairs, and as co-founder of Democracy at Work he hosts the nationally syndicated program Economic Update and the online series Ask Prof Wolff; his books also include Understanding Capitalism, Understanding Socialism, Understanding Marxism and The Sickness Is the System.⁠[11]

He lives in New York City with his wife, Harriet Fraad; they have two adult children.⁠[1]

Personal website: Public link: https://www.rdwolff.com/ (opens in a new window)⁠[10]

Democracy at Work: Official website: https://www.democracyatwork.info/ (opens in a new window)⁠[8]