Simon Johnson

Faculty

Simon Johnson

Support Staff

Get in Touch

Title

About

Academic Groups

Academic Area

Centers & Initiatives

SIMON JOHNSON is the Ronald A. Kurtz (1954) Professor of Entrepreneurship at the MIT Sloan School of Management, where he is head of the Global Economics and Management group. In 2007-08 he was chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, and he currently co-chairs the CFA Institute Systemic Risk Council. In February 2021, Johnson joined the board of directors of Fannie Mae.

Johnson’s most recent book, with Daron Acemoglu, Power and Progress: Our 1000-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity, explores the history and economics of major technological transformations up to and including the latest developments in Artificial Intelligence.

His previous book, with Jonathan Gruber, Jump-Starting America: How Breakthrough Science Can Revive Economic Growth and the American Dream, explained how to create millions of good new jobs around the U.S., through renewed public investment in research and development. This proposal attracted bipartisan support.

Johnson was previously a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, D.C., a cofounder of BaselineScenario.com, a member of the Congressional Budget Office’s Panel of Economic Advisors, and a member of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s Systemic Resolution Advisory Committee. From July 2014 to early 2017, Johnson was a member of the Financial Research Advisory Committee of the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Financial Research (OFR), within which he chaired the Global Vulnerabilities Working Group.

The Quiet Coup” received over a million views when it appeared in The Atlantic in early 2009. His book 13 Bankers: the Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown (with James Kwak), was an immediate bestseller and has become one of the mostly highly regarded books on the financial crisis. Their follow-up book on U.S. fiscal policy, White House Burning: The Founding Fathers, Our National Debt, and Why It Matters for You, won praise across the political spectrum. Johnson’s academic research papers on long-term economic development, corporate finance, political economy, and public health are widely cited.

“For his articulate and outspoken support for public policies to end too-big-to-fail”, Johnson was named a Main Street Hero by the Independent Community Bankers of America (ICBA) in 2013.

IMPORTANT: For any media or appointment requests to Professor Johnson please be sure to copy Michelle Fiorenza: fiorenza@mit.edu

Honors

Johnson wins Jamieson Prize

Simon Johnson and Kristin Forbes have recently been appointed to the Congressional Budget Office's Panel of Economic Advisers

Publications

"Design and Implementation of the Price Cap on Russian Oil Export."

Simon Johnson, Łukasz Rachel, and Catherine Wolfram. Journal of Comparative Economics. Forthcoming.

"The Impact of Generative Artificial Intelligence on Socioeconomic Inequalities and Policy Making."

Capraro, Valerio, Austin Lentsch, and Daron Acemoglu et al., Working Paper. December 2023.

"The Design and Implementation of the Price Cap on Russian Oil."

Johnson, Simon, Łukasz Rachel, and Catherine Wolfram. VoxEU, August 19, 2023.

Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity.

Acemoglu, Daron and Simon Johnson. New York, NY: PublicAffairs/Hachette Book Group, 2023.

"Place-Based Productivity and Costs in Science."

Gruber, Jonathan, Simon Johnson, Enrico Moretti. In Entrepreneurship and Innovation Policy and the Economy, edited by Benjamin Jones and Josh Lerner, 167-184. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2023. NBER Working Paper.

"The Price Cap on Russian Oil Exports, Explained."

Wolfram, Catherine, Simon Johnson, and Łukasz Rachel. Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, December 2022.

Load More

Recent Insights

Ideas Made to Matter

From MIT, a technically informed approach to governing AI

In new policy briefs, MIT researchers outline how to regulate large language models, label AI-generated content, and pursue “pro-worker AI.”

Read Article
Ideas Made to Matter

Generative AI research from MIT Sloan

Ideas about how to best deploy generative artificial intelligence, how it will affect the workforce, and how it should be regulated.

Read Article
Load More

Media Highlights

Load More

Events

Executive Education

Executive Education Course

Economics for Business

This eight-week online program offers you the opportunity to explore macroeconomics from a business perspective, guided by renowned economist Professor Roberto Rigobon.

  • Oct 4-Dec 5, 2023
  • Apr 10-Jun 11, 2024
View Course
Executive Education Course

Making AI Work: Machine Intelligence for Business and Society

Over six weeks, you’ll explore the technical and strategic considerations for robust, beneficial, and responsible AI deployment. You’ll examine the various stages of a proprietary ML Deployment Framework and unlock new opportunities by investigating the key challenges and their related impact. Guided by leading experts and MIT academics, you’ll build a toolkit for addressing these challenges within your own organization and context.

  • Nov 15, 2023-Jan 23, 2024
  • Jun 5-Jul 23, 2024
  • Aug 14-Oct 1, 2024
  • Mar 13-Apr 30, 2024
  • Nov 20, 2024-Jan 28, 2025
View Course
Load More