Background
Findlay, Ronald Edsel was born on April 12, 1935 in Rangoon, Burma. Came to the United States, 1969. Naturalized, 1976. Son of George and Hilda Beryl (Noble) Findlay.
Findlay, Ronald Edsel was born on April 12, 1935 in Rangoon, Burma. Came to the United States, 1969. Naturalized, 1976. Son of George and Hilda Beryl (Noble) Findlay.
Bachelor of Arts Rangoon University, 1954. Doctor of Philosophy Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass., USA, 1960.
Tutor Economics, Rangoon University, 1954-1957. Lector, Professor of Economics, Rangoon University, 1960-1969. Professor of Economics, Columbia University, 1969-1977.
Gunnar Myrdal Visiting Research Professor Intematational Economics, Stockholm,1984. Ragnar Nurkse Professor of Economics, Columbia University, since 1977.
The relationships between economic growth
and development and international trade and factor mobility have been the main focus of my work. My first paper was on the effects of technological progress on the terms of trade. My 1973 book put forward a series of interrelated models of trade and development drawn from a variety of sources in neoclassical and ‘Cambridge’ growth and capital theory, but adapted to apply to the structural conditions of the developing countries.
They could perhaps be described as representing the application of ‘marginalist’ theory to ‘structuralist’ problems, with Samuelson and Solow as the source of the former and Lewis and Murkse of the latter. These twin sources of inspiration are perhaps best revealed in my recent work on ‘North-South’ models of asymmetric interdependence in the world economy, involving trade between a Solow-type industrialised ‘North’ characterised by full employment of a growing labour force and a Lewis-type ‘South’ characterised by surplus labour, with the terms of trade linking the growth rates of the two regions. Another recent interest has been the attempt to ‘endogenise’ the stocks of physical and human capital in the Heckscher-Ohlin trade model by combining it with an ‘Austrian’ view of the production process.
I have also been interested in the application of economic theory to economic history, with a 1975 paper on slavery and manumission in antiquity and a 1982 paper on trade and growth in the industrial revolution. Currently I am engaged in what may be called neoclassical political economy, using simple general equilibrium models to analyse the role of the State and the ‘rent-seeking’ activities of interest groups.
Member American Economic Association.
Married Tin Tin Aye, December 16, 1961. 1 child, Vanessa.