Macroeconomics in the Age of Climate Change

Duncan Foley and Lance Taylor have been named the winners of the 2015 Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. The award recognizes the contributions that the researchers have made to understanding the relationships between environmental quality and the macroeconomy. They each will give lectures at the ceremony, which takes place on March 23 at 5:30 p.m. in ASEAN Auditorium of the Cabot Center on the Medford/Somerville campus.

The Global Development and Environment Institute (GDAE), which is jointly affiliated with the School of Arts and Sciences and the Fletcher School, created the Leontief Prize in 2000 in memory of the Nobel Prize-winning economist and GDAE advisory board member Wassily Leontief. The award recognizes economists whose work combines theoretical and empirical research that promotes a more comprehensive understanding of social and environmental processes.

Taylor is an emeritus professor of economics at the New School for Social Research and the former Arnhold Professor of International Cooperation and Development. Foley is the Leo Model Professor of Economics at the New School for Social Research.

“Lance Taylor’s research has integrated relevant social relations into macroeconomic models and is of critical importance for understanding present and future environmental realities and challenges,” says GDAE co-director Neva Goodwin. “Duncan Foley’s unique approach to combining research on political economy with advances in statistics and a broad grasp of the relevant data has produced a deeper appreciation of the policy consequences of economists’ choices in theories and models.”

Foley has made seminal contributions in a wide range of areas, including economic theory, statistical reasoning, Marxian value theory and problems of social coordination. His recent research includes work on the economics of global warming, economics and thermodynamics, complexity theory and classical political economy. His 2006 book, Adam’s Fallacy: A Guide to Economic Theology, examines the history of political economy and economics.

Taylor has been a professor in the economics departments of Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has published widely in the areas of macroeconomics, development economics and economic theory. His most recent book is Maynard’s Revenge: The Collapse of Free Market Macroeconomics. He has served as a visiting scholar or policy advisor in more than 25 countries, including Chile, Brazil, Nicaragua, Cuba, Russia and Egypt.