Ronald Findlay

Ronald Edsel Findlay (April 12, 1935 – October 8, 2021) was an American economist and trade theorist. He served as the Ragnar Nurkse Professor of Economics at Columbia University.

He was born in 1935 in Rangoon, then in British Burma. He and his family fled on foot from Burma to India during World War II.

He received a BA from Rangoon University in 1954, and a PhD from MIT in 1960, where his doctoral dissertation was supervised by Robert Solow. He began his career as an economist at Rangoon University, first as a tutor (1954–57), then as a lecturer (1960–66), and finally as a research professor (1966–68). He helped theorise the North-South model of international trade. He became a U.S. citizen in 1976.

Findlay died on October 8, 2021, at the age of 86.

Selected publications Selected publications include: with Kevin H. O'Rourke, 2007, "Power and Plenty: Trade, War, and the World Economy in the Second Millennium", Princeton University Press with Ronald W. Jones, 2001, "Input Trade and the Location of Production", The American Economic Review 1996 "Modeling Global Interdependence: Centers, Peripheries, and Frontiers", The American Economic Review with Richard Clarida, 1992, "Government, Trade, and Comparative Advantage", The American Economic Review (1992); 1992 "The Roots of Divergence: Western Economic History in Comparative Perspective", The American Economic Review with Stanislaw Wellisz, 1988, "The State and the Invisible Hand", World Bank Research Observer 1984 "Trade and Development: Theory and Asian Experience", Asian Development Review, Vol 2, No. 2 An "Austrian" Model of International Trade and Interest Rate Equalization, in Journal of Political Economy