Thomas Herndon

Thomas Herndon (born 25 February, 1985) is an associate professor of economics at John Jay College, CUNY in New York City, who has previously worked as assistant professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. During his PhD studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst Herndon became known for critiquing "Growth in a Time of Debt", a widely cited academic paper by Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff supporting the austerity policies implemented by governments in Europe and North America in the early 21st century. His research concluded that these measures may not have been necessary.

Herndon proved that the paper contained multiple errors, provoking widespread international interest. It was also frequently cited among policymakers in congress, including in the drafting of the Bowles-Simpson report. However, there are differing views on the actual impact the original paper may have had on policy making. New York magazine wrote that Herndon "just used part of his spring semester to shake the intellectual foundation of the global austerity movement."

Discovery of flaws in "Growth in a Time of Debt"

During his graduate studies in a class with Professor Michael Ash, Herndon was assigned to pick an economics paper and try to replicate the results. He chose "Growth in a Time of Debt", and throughout the semester his attempts to replicate the results proved unsuccessful. After further consultation with his professors Michael Ash and Robert Pollin, Herndon was encouraged to contact the authors Reinhart and Rogoff at Harvard. They provided him with the actual working spreadsheet they had used to obtain their results. Herndon looked into the detail of the original spreadsheet and found several issues: