James S. Duesenberry, 1918-

James Stemble Duesenberry, nacido en Princeton, WV, estudió y obtuvo el doctorado en la Universidad de Michigan. Fue profesor en Harvard y el MIT. Actualmente es profesor emérito de Dinero y Banca en el Departamento de Economía de la Universidad de Harvard.

En 1949 propuso una función de consumo de tipo keynesiano argumentando que el comportamiento de consumo crea hábito y proponiendo que los individuos aumentan su consumo al aumentar las rentas pero que tienen dificultades para reducir su consumo en la misma proporción cuando la renta disminuye.

Posteriormente, en 1958,  y siguiendo un razonamiento similar,  hace una contribución al acelerador y la teoría keynesiana de los ciclos. Para Duesenberry, la inversión depende de los niveles históricos alcanzados por la renta y el capital. 

Curriculum Vitae

Nombre: James Stemble Duesenberry
Nacimiento: 18 de julio de 1918

Titulaciones: 
A.B., 1939, University of Michigan
A.M., 1941, University of Michigan
Ph.D., 1948, University of Michigan

Puestos académicos:
1939-1941 Teaching Fellow, University of Michigan
1941 Research Fellow, Social Science Research Council
1942-1945 U.S. Air Force
1946 Instructor, M.I.T.
1946-1948 Teaching Fellow, Harvard University
1948-1953 Assistant Professor, Harvard University
1953 Associate Professor, Harvard University
1954-1955 Fulbright Fellow, Cambridge University
1955-1989 Professor, Department of Economics, Harvard University
1958-1959 Ford Research Professor
1966-1968 Member of President's Council of Economic Advisers
1969-1974 Chairman, Board of Directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
1972-1977 Chairman, Department of Economics, Harvard University
1981-Present Consultant, Harvard Institute for International Development en Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Gambia
1984 Visiting Professor, University of Kobe, Japan
1989- Professor Emeritus, Department of Economics, Harvard University
1989 Visiting Professor, Southwest University of Finance and Economic, ChengDu, Sichuan, China
1989- Consultant, Harvard Institute for International Development

Obras de Duesenberry: 

• "Income-Consumption Relations and their Implications", 1948, in Metzler, editor, Income, Employment and Public Policy. 
• Income, Saving and the Theory of Consumer Behavior, 1949. 
• "The Mechanics of Inflation", 1950, REStat. 
• "The Methodological Basis of Economic Theory", 1954, REStat 
• Business Cycles and Economic Growth, 1958. 
• "Underlying Factors in the Post-War Inflation",1959, in Myers, editor, Wages, Prices, Profits and Productivity 
• Cases and Problems in Economics, 1960. 
• "A Simulation of the U.S. Economy in Recession", with O. Eckstein and G. Fromm, 1960, Econometrica 
• "A Process Approach to Flow-of-Funds Analysis", 1962, in Flow-of-Funds Approach to Social Accounting 
• "The Portfolio Approach to the Demand for Money and Other Assets", 1963, REStat 
• The Brookings Quarterly Econometric Model of the United States, with L. Klein and G. Fromm, 1965
• Money and Credit: Impact and control, 1967. 
• "Alternatives to Monetary Policy", 1974, AER 
• Money, Banking and the Economy, with T. Mayer, and R.Z. Aliber, 1984?