Abram Bergson was the venerable dean of Soviet economic studies in the United States. During my undergraduate and graduate days, I was assigned in four different courses one chapter from his magnum opus, The real national income of Soviet Russia since 1928 (Cambridge, Harvard, University Press, 1961). In that chapter Bergson provided an exposition of Richard Moorsteen’s economic theory of quantity indexes. In comparison John Rawls’ Theory of Justice was only assigned in three of my undergraduate and graduate courses! I cross-registered from MIT for Bergson’s seminar in socialist economics at Harvard during the Spring semester of 1975 with the ulterior motive of obtaining a Harvard library card.
In point of fact, I had first encountered the work of Abram Bergson several years earlier. During my freshman year at Yale (1969-70), I was assigned Francis Bator’s article on the simple analytics of welfare maximization in which Bergson’s concept of the Social Welfare Function was discussed [A. Burk (Bergson) “A Reformulation of Certain Aspects of Welfare Economics,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Feb. 1938, LII, 310-14].
Paul Samuelson, who was a graduate student of economics at Harvard with Bergson, was a tireless champion of his friend’s contribution to welfare economics. See, Paul A. Samuelson, “Abram Bergson, 1914-2003: A Biographical Memoir”, in National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs, Volume 84 (Washington, D.C.: 2004).
For Bergson’s work in Soviet Economic Studies see John Hardt, “Abram Bergson’s Legacy: 1914-2003”.
Today’s artifact is a Social Science Research Council biographical note for Abram Bergson, 1946-47 fellow.
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Bergson, Abram
Demobilization Award 1946-47
b. Baltimore, Md. April 21, 1914. m. Rita S. Macht 1939. c. Judith 1940, Emily 1946, Lucy 1948. B.A. 1933, Johns Hopkins; Ph.D. 1940, Harvard, economics. Instructor 1937-38, 1939-40, Harvard; assistant professor 1940- 42, University of Texas; economist 1942-46, chief 1944-46, Economics Subdivision, USSR Division, Office of Strategic Services; visiting associate professor 1946-47, associate professor 1947-50, professor of economics 1950—, Columbia University, New York 27. Home: 35 Claremont Ave. New York 27.
Sheldon Travelling Fellow summer 1937, 1938-39, Harvard. Consultant: Department of State 1944-46, 1948—; Rand Corporation 1948—; Operations Research Office, Johns Hopkins University, 1949. Member of American Delegation to Reparations Conference 1945, Moscow. Publications: “Incidence of an Income Tax on Savings,” Quar. J. Econ. 1942; “Distribution of the Earnings Bill among Industrial Workers in the Soviet Union,” J. Polit. Econ. 1942; “Prices, Wages and Income Theory,” Econometrica 1942; “Price Flexibility and the Level of Income,” Rev. Statis. 1943; The Structure of Soviet Wages: A Study in Socialist Economics 1944; “The Fourth Five Year Plan: Heavy versus Consumers’ Goods Industries,” Polit. Sci. Quar. 1947; “A Problem in Soviet Statistics,” Rev. Econ. Statis. 1947; “Soviet Defense Expenditures,” For. Affairs 1948; “Socialist Economics” in A Survey of Contemporary Economics (ed. H. Ellis) 1948; (with J. Blackman and A. Erlich) “Russian Postwar Reconstruction and Development,” The Annals 1949. Fellowship program: research in Washington on Soviet economy.
Source: Fellows of the Social Science Research Council, 1925-1951. New York: 1951, p. 30.