Ohlin, Bertil Gotthard (1899-1979), was a Swedish economist and political leader best known for his study of trade between nations. He shared the 1977 Nobel Prize for economic sciences with the British economist James Meade (see Meade, James Edward ). They received the award for their advances in the fields of international trade and finance.
Ohlin’s most famous work is Interregional and International Trade (1933). In it, he explains his own adaptation of a theory developed by one of his former teachers, the Swedish economist Eli Heckscher. This theory, now known as the Heckscher-Ohlin theory, states that a nation will produce goods from resources that the nation itself possesses in abundance. It also says that a nation will import goods from other nations if making the goods requires resources that the nation lacks.
Ohlin also developed influential theories involving macroeconomic policy (policy pertaining to the economy as a whole) and international payments for war damages. A series of his lectures appeared in the collection The Problem of Employment Stabilization in 1949.
Ohlin was born on April 23, 1899, in Klippan, near Angelholm, Sweden. He studied mathematics, statistics, and economics at Lund University. After he became interested in Heckscher’s writings, he enrolled in the Stockholm School of Economics, where Heckscher taught at the time. Ohlin next attended Stockholm University, where he eventually earned his Ph.D. degree in 1924. He also studied at Cambridge University and Harvard University.
In 1925, Ohlin became a professor at Copenhagen University, and he taught there for five years. After Heckscher left the Stockholm School of Business Administration, Ohlin returned to Stockholm to fill his position. He taught at the school from 1930 to 1965. From 1938 to 1970, Ohlin served as a member of the Riksdag, the Swedish parliament. From 1944 to 1967, he headed the Swedish Liberal Party. Ohlin died on Aug. 3, 1979.
