Richard Stone facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Richard Stone
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Stone in 1984
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| Born | 30 August 1913 London, England
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| Died | 6 December 1991 (aged 78) Cambridge, England
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| Institution | Cambridge University |
| Field | Economics |
| Alma mater | Cambridge University |
| Doctoral students |
James Mirrlees Angus Deaton |
| Influences | James Meade Colin Clark |
| Contributions | National accounts, input-output |
| Awards | Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (1984) |
| Information at IDEAS / RePEc | |
Sir John Richard Nicholas Stone (born August 30, 1913 – died December 6, 1991) was a famous British economist. He studied at Cambridge University. In 1984, he won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. He received this award for creating a special way to track how money and goods move in a country's economy. This system is called an accounting model. It can be used to follow economic activities for a whole country, and later, for many countries together.
Contents
Early Life and Education
Richard Stone was born in London, UK, on August 30, 1913. He went to good schools like Westminster School. When he was 17, he traveled to India with his father. His father was a judge in Madras. From India, Richard visited other countries in Asia, such as Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia.
After a year of travel, he returned to London. In 1931, he started studying law at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He studied law for two years.
Discovering Economics
Young Richard Stone then decided to study economics. He became interested in economics because he believed that "if there were more economists, the world would be a better place." This was during the Great Slump of the 1930s. Many people did not have jobs then. This made him want to understand why it happened and how to fix it.
His parents were not happy with his choice at first. But Stone was very excited to become an economist. He enjoyed learning about it. At Cambridge, he learned from teachers like Richard Kahn and Gerald Shove. He was especially influenced by Colin Clark, who taught him statistics. Clark introduced Stone to a project about measuring a country's total income, called national income. This project later led to Stone winning the Nobel Prize. Stone and Clark became good friends.
Career Highlights
After finishing his studies in 1935, Richard Stone worked at Lloyd's of London. This was until World War II started. During the war, he worked for the British Government. He was a statistician and economist with James Meade. They studied the UK's economy to see what resources the country had for the war. During this time, they created the first ideas for the system of national accounts. Their work led to the UK's first national accounts in 1941.
Government and Academic Work
After 1941, Stone and Meade worked separately. Stone became an assistant to John Maynard Keynes at the Central Statistical Office. Stone stopped working for the government when the war ended in 1945.
After the war, Stone started teaching at Cambridge University. He became the director of the new Department of Applied Economics (DAE) from 1945 to 1955. As director, Stone made the department focus on new research. This research was about economic ideas and how to use statistics. Many top economists joined the department because of this. The DAE became one of the best places in the world for economic research. Stone worked on projects about national accounting, understanding what people buy, and social statistics.
Later Projects and Leadership
In 1955, Stone left his director role. He became a professor of Finance and Accounting at Cambridge. With J.A.C. Brown, he started the Cambridge Growth Project. This project created a large computer model of the British economy. They used Social Accounting Matrices (SAM), which are like detailed maps of an economy. These maps helped create economic models used by organizations like the World Bank.
From 1978 to 1980, Stone was the President of the Royal Economic Society. He retired from Cambridge in 1980. A company called Cambridge Econometrics was started in 1978. Stone was its first honorary president. This company still uses the economic model he helped create to predict how the economy will change.
Major Achievements
In 1984, Richard Stone received the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. He won it for creating an accounting model. This model could track economic activities for a country, and later, for many countries around the world.
Double-Entry Accounting System
While others had worked in this area, Stone was the first to use a double-entry accounting method. This system means that every item of income must be matched by an item of spending. This creates a balanced system. This double-entry system is used in almost all modern accounting today. It allowed for a very reliable way to track trade and money transfers globally.
He is sometimes called the 'father of national income accounting'. He also wrote studies about what people buy, how economies grow, and input-output relationships. In his Nobel acceptance speech, Stone mentioned François Quesnay and his Tableau économique. Stone said it was one of the first works to look at different parts of an economy and how they are all connected.
Personal Life
Richard Stone was married three times. In 1936, he married Winifred Mary Jenkins. They both loved economics. They started a monthly paper called Trends about British economic conditions. Their marriage ended in 1940.
In 1941, Stone married his second wife, Feodora Leontinoff. Feodora passed away in 1956.
In 1960, he married Giovanna Saffi. She was the great-grandchild of an Italian hero, Aurelio Saffi. Giovanna became his partner in many of his works. They worked together on several economic projects. For example, they rewrote his book "National Income and Expenditure" in 1961.
Later Years
Richard Stone died on December 6, 1991, in Cambridge. He was 78 years old. His third wife, Giovanna, and his daughter, Caroline, survived him.
Selected Publications
- Richard Stone and Giovanna Saffi Stone, Social Accounting and Economic Models (1959)
- Richard Stone and Giovanna Saffi Stone, National Income and Expenditure (1961)
Images for kids
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Richard Stone in 1984
See also
In Spanish: Richard Stone para niños
