Claudia Goldin is the Henry Lee Professor of Economics at Harvard University and holds the Lee and Ezpeleta Professorship of Arts & Sciences at Harvard University. She was the director of the NBER’s Development of the American Economy program from 1989 to 2017 and is a co-director of the NBER's Gender in the Economy group. Goldin was awarded the 2023 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel “for having advanced our understanding of women’s labour market outcomes.”
An economic historian and a labor economist, Goldin's research covers a wide range of topics, including the female labor force, the gender gap in earnings, income inequality, technological change, education, and immigration. Most of her research interprets the present through the lens of the past and explores the origins of current issues of concern. Her most recent book is Career & Family: Women's Century-Long Journey toward Equity (Princeton University Press, 2021), which has been translated into 15 languages.
She is the author and editor of several books, among them Understanding the Gender Gap: An Economic History of American Women (Oxford 1990), The Regulated Economy: A Historical Approach to Political Economy (with G. Libecap; University of Chicago Press 1994), The Defining Moment: The Great Depression and the American Economy in the Twentieth Century (with M. Bordo and E. White; University of Chicago Press 1998), Corruption and Reform: Lesson’s from America’s Economic History (with E. Glaeser; Chicago 2006), and Women Working Longer: Increased Employment at Older Ages (with L. Katz; Chicago 2018). Her book The Race between Education and Technology (with L. Katz; Belknap Press, 2008, 2010) was the winner of the 2008 R.R. Hawkins Award for the most outstanding scholarly work in all disciplines of the arts and sciences.
Goldin is best known for her historical work on women in the U.S. economy. Her most influential papers in that area have concerned the history of women’s quest for career and family, coeducation in higher education, the impact of the “Pill” on women’s career and marriage decisions, women’s surnames after marriage as a social indicator, the reasons why women are now the majority of undergraduates, and the new lifecycle of women’s employment.
Goldin was the president of the American Economic Association in 2013 and was president of the Economic History Association in 1999/2000. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Philosophical Society and a fellow of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Society of Labor Economists (SOLE), the Econometric Society, and the Cliometric Society. She received the IZA Prize in Labor Economics in 2016 and in 2009 SOLE awarded Goldin the Mincer Prize for life-time contributions to the field of labor economics. She received the 2019 BBVA Frontiers in Knowledge award and the 2020 Nemmers award, both in economics. From 1984 to 1988 she was editor of the Journal of Economic History. She is the recipient of several teaching awards. Goldin received her B.A. from Cornell University and her Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.
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Interviews and Videos:
WBUR On Point with Meghna Chakrabarti (November 17, 2022). Audio is here and a partial transcript is here.
Manisha Aggarwal-Schifelite, "Women Mostly Stayed in the Workforce as Pandemic Unfolded," Harvard Gazette (May 17, 2022).
Listen to a fun interview on "Conversations with Tyler": "Claudia Goldin on the Economics of Inequality." The interview isn't just about inequality. It is all about Tyler Cowen's amazingly wide-ranging questions (Oct. 2021).
Claudia Goldin can be heard on Living Longer, Better, Smarter (May 25, 2021).
Listen to Claudia Goldin on The Conference Board's podcast Sustaining Capitalism be interviewed about the role of the COVID-19 pandemic on the female workforce and the future of work, schooling, and caregiving.
See the amazing Marginal Revolution video on the research and personal life of Claudia Goldin here. It is part of the Women in Economics Series. Also see Claudia Goldin narrate the video on Anna J. Schwartz.
The 2020 NBER Martin Feldstein Lecture, Journey Across a Century of Women (July 2020).
Tackle Gender Inequality at Home and at Work. Keynote speech (transcribed) at the Becker Friedman Institute for Research in Economics, March 2019. Chicago Booth Review.Goldin, Claudia.
Time Traveler. Interview by Peter J. Walker. People in Economics. International Monetary Fund, Finance and Development. December, 2018.
The Truth About the Gender Pay Gap. Interview by Sarah Kliff. Vox. 2017. Internet.
The Gender Pay Gap. Interview by Emma Plumb. 1 Million for Work Flexibility. 2016. Internet
On Equal Pay Day, Why the Gender Gap Still Exists. Interview by Ari Shapiro. All Things Considered. 2016. Internet.
The True Story of the Gender Pay Gap. Interview by Steve Dubner. Freakonomics Radio Podcast. 2016. Internet.
Interview for Econ Focus, Fourth Quarter. 2014. Internet. PDF version
Exploring the Present Through the Past. Interview by Brian Snowden. World Economics, vol. 8, no. 4. Oct-Dec. 2007.
Interview for The Region. Interview by Douglas Clement. Vol. 18, no. 3. September 2004, a quarterly publication of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
The Economist as Detective, a brief autobiographical essay from M. Szenberg, ed., Passion and Craft: Economists at Work. The University of Michigan Press (1998)