Evsey David Domar

Evsey David Domar

American economist of Russian origin
Date of Birth: 16.04.1914
Country: USA

Biography of Evsey David Domar

Evsey David Domar, an American economist of Russian descent, is renowned as one of the co-authors of the "Harrod-Domar growth model." He was born on April 16, 1914, in Łódź, which was then part of the Russian Empire. His original surname was Domashevitsky. Domar grew up and received his education in Russian Outer Manchuria, and in 1936, he successfully emigrated to the United States.

In the United States, Domar wasted no time and completed his bachelor's degree at the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1939. He obtained a master's degree from the University of Michigan in 1940, and another master's degree from Harvard University in 1943. Four years later, he defended his doctoral dissertation at Harvard University.

In 1946, Evsey Domar married Carola Rosenthal, and they had two children together. Domar taught at Carnegie Institute of Technology, University of Chicago, Johns Hopkins University, and, from 1957 until the end of his professorial career, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He was a member of several scientific organizations, including the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Econometric Society, and the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences.

From 1962 to 1965, Professor Domar served on the executive committee of the American Economic Association, and in 1970, he became its vice president. He also served as the president of the Association for Comparative Economics. Additionally, Domar collaborated with the RAND Corporation, the Ford Foundation, the Brookings Institution, the National Science Foundation, the Battelle Memorial Institute, and the Institute for Defense Analysis.

Evsey Domar passed away on April 1, 1997, at Emerson Hospital in Concord, Massachusetts, two weeks before his 83rd birthday. He was a prominent follower of Keynesian economics and made significant contributions to three main areas of economics: economic history, comparative economics, and the theory of economic growth. In 1946, Domar proposed the idea that economic growth could be used to reduce deficits and public debt. During the Cold War, he was an expert on the Soviet economy.

However, his most famous work is the "Harrod-Domar growth model," which he developed simultaneously with the British economist Roy Forbes Harrod, although independently. This model served as a precursor to all modern growth models and was distinguished only by its restrictive assumption of fixed proportions in production. One of Domar's most notable students was the economic historian Robert Fogel, who was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 1993.

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