BSOS Remembers ECON Professor Barbara Bergmann

Barbara Bergmann, 87, a pioneering economist, author and academician whose work shaped public policies including social security, affirmative action, childcare and welfare, died in her home in Bethesda, Md., on April 5. The College of Behavioral and Social Sciences joins with Professor Bergmann’s family, friends and colleagues in celebrating the life and legacy of this extraordinary member of our community.

Professor Bergmann’s research, teaching and advocacy on social policies, the economics of race and gender, computer simulations of economic systems, and the state of economic science impacted national policies and dialogues. She authored and coauthored numerous influential books on social issues and on computer simulation models and economic science. She also wrote columns on economics for The New York Times in the 1980s.

She served as president of the American Association of University Professors; of the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics; of the International Association for Feminist Economics, which she helped found; and of the Eastern Economic Association. Professor Bergmann was a recipient of the Carolyn Shaw Bell Award of the American Economic Association for improving the status of women in economics.

Professor Bergmann earned B.A. from Cornell University in 1948, as well as an M.A. and a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1958. While attending Cornell on a scholarship, she developed a strong interest in and a passionate concern for racial and sex discrimination, which continued throughout her career.

Her academic career included serving as an instructor in economics and as a senior research associate at Harvard from 1958 to 1961; as an associate professor of economics at Brandeis University from 1962 to 1964; as an associate professor and a professor of economics at the University of Maryland from 1965 to 1988, and a professor emerita from 1988 until her passing; and as a distinguished professor of economics at American University from 1988 to 1997, and a professor emerita from 1997 until her passing.

Professor Bergmann’s professional work included serving as an economist with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics in the New York Regional Office and with the New York Metropolitan Region Study; serving as senior staff economist for the Council of Economic Advisors, Executive Office of the President for the Kennedy administration from 1961 to 1962; serving as a senior staff member at the Brookings Institution; and serving as senior economic advisor to the U.S. Agency for International Development from 1966 to 1967. She also was an advisor to the Congressional Budget Office, to the Bureau of the Census, and to the U.S. Council on Wage and Price Stability.

A daughter of East European immigrants, Barbara Bermanwas born in the Bronx in 1927 and remained a New Yorker at heart all her life.

Professor Bergmann is survived by a son, David Martin Bergmann; his wife, Gioia J. Bergmann; and their children, Trevor, Ethan, and Owen; and by a daughter, Sarah Nellie Bergmann, and Ms. Sarah Bergmann’s life partner, John C. Olmert. Professor Bergmann was preceded in death by her husband, Fred Heinz Bergmann, who passed away on May 2, 2011.

Read the New York Times obituary.

A memorial service will be held at American University’s Katzen Arts Center at 3 p.m. on April 28.

Published on Mon, Apr 13, 2015 - 9:01AM