Alan Krueger Led a Quiet Economics Revolution

It was with great sadness that I learned that Princeton University economist Alan Krueger had died over the weekend at the age of 58. In his outstanding but too-brief career, Krueger helped turn the economics profession into a more empirical, more scientific enterprise. His research shed light on many of the most important policy issues facing the U.S., and he put that knowledge to good use working for two presidential administrations. He will be greatly missed.

I first met Krueger at a conference called the Princeton Data Improvement Initiative, back in 2008. The conference’s theme was how to make empirical economics research more credible. I was instantly impressed by Krueger’s tireless, patient attention to the details of both data sets and research methods. Some economists tend to trumpet their own work; others strenuously argue against methods that lead to implications they don’t like. But Krueger was always a beacon of cool-headed reason -- his overriding goal was to get the facts.