Douglass North
Douglass North
Douglass Cecil Northwas an American economist known for his work in economic history. He was the co-recipientof the 1993 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. In the words of the Nobel Committee, North and Fogel "renewed research in economic history by applying economic theory and quantitative methods in order to explain economic and institutional change."...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionEconomist
Date of Birth5 November 1920
CountryUnited States of America
Douglass North quotes about
left life scholarly totally
I would be remiss if I left the impression that my life has been totally preoccupied with scholarly research.
accepted came company harvard head insurance life moved offered office position san time west
When it came time to go to college, I had been accepted for Harvard when my father was offered the position of head of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company office on the west coast, and we moved to San Francisco.
conducive environment last michigan northern summers work
My wife and I now live in the summers in northern Michigan in an environment which is wonderfully conducive to research, and where most of my work in the last 15 years has been done.
change framework led occupied performance
The development of a political-economic framework to explore long-run institutional change occupied me during all of the 1980s and led to the publication of Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance in 1990.
communist everybody found indeed invaded june lone opposed peace shifted since suddenly supporter supporters union war
I was opposed to World War II, and indeed on June 22, 1941 when Hitler invaded the Soviet Union I suddenly found myself the lone supporter of peace since everybody else had, because of their communist beliefs, shifted over to become supporters of the war.
school secondary
I went to elementary school in Ottawa, and then to a private secondary school.
ignorance shapes today
To predict the future we would have to know today what we will learn tomorrow which will shape our future actions
successful creative competition
Conformity can be costly in a world of uncertainty which requires innovative institutional creation because no one can know the right path to survival. Over time, the richer the cultural context in terms of providing multiple experimentation and creative competition, the more likely the successful survival of the society
fashion writing order
Regarding social order, Francis Fukuyama writes, "The systematic study of how order, and thus social capital, can emerge in spontaneous and decentralized fashion is one of the most important intellectual developments of the late twentieth century." He correctly attributes the modern origins of this argument to F. A. Hayek, whose pioneering contributions to cognitive science, the study of cultural evolution, and the dynamics of social change put him in the forefront of the most creative scholars of the 20th century.
numbers cost information
Information costs are reduced by the existence of large numbers of buyers and sellers. Under these conditions, prices embody the same information that would require large search costs by individual buyers and sellers in the absence of an organized market.
california records mediocre
My record at the University of California as an undergraduate was mediocre to say the best.
relationship analysis banking
My early work and publications centered around expanding on the analysis of life insurance in my dissertation and its relationship to investment banking.
photography school winning
While I was there I became deeply interested in photography, and indeed the most noteworthy event in my early life was winning first, third, fourth and seventh prizes in an international competition for college and high school students.
sister brother war
My brother and sister are both older than I am and were born before my father went off to World War I.