Abba Ptachya Lerner (October 28, 1903 - October 27, 1982) was an American economist.

Lerner was born on October 28, 1903 in Bessarabia. He grew up in a Jewish family, which emigrated to Great Britain, when Lerner was three years old. Lerner grew up in the London East End. From the age of sixteen he worked as a machinist, a teacher in Hebrew schools, and as a businessman. He entered the London School of Economics in 1929. A six month stay at Cambridge in 1934-1935 brought him into contact with John Maynard Keynes. Abba married Fraucine Klining in 1936; they had one child, Albert, born in December of 1936.

In 1937 Lerner emigrated to the United States.

Accomplishments

• Just like Oskar Lange, Lerner developed, a model of market socialism, which differed form the pure planned economy. It became known as the Third Way.

• Like Wassily Leontief, Lerner improved the calculations made by Wilhelm Launhardt on the effect of terms of trade.

• Furthermore Lerner improved a formula of Alfred Marshall, which is known since as the Marshall-Lerner principle.

• The Lerner-Samuelson theorem also goes back to Lerner.

• Lerner developed the concept of distributive efficiency, which shows that economic equality will produce the greatest total happiness with a given amount of wealth.

• Lerner also contributed to the Lange-Lerner-Taylor theorem.

• The Lerner symmetry theorem states that an import tariff can have the same effects as an export tax.

• The Lerner Index measures potential monopoly power as the negative inverse of demand elasticity.

External links

• lhttp://www.economyprofessor.com/theorists/abbalerner.php
• http://cepa.newschool.edu/het/profiles/lerner.htm
• http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/bios/Lerner.html

1903 births | 1982 deaths | Alumni of the London School of Economics | American_economists | Economists

Abba P. Lerner | アバ・P・ラーナー | Лернер, Абба